Chapter Thirteen
He cradled me against his body and used his other hand to strum against my lower back.
“You’re the same shape as my guitar.”
“That’s not flattering at all.”
He smiled down at me. “Yes it is. I love the shape of you.”
“Grady—”
He placed his fingertips between the grooves of my spine and used the fingers of his other hand to brush against my lower back once more. It felt—I wiggled a little closer and pressed my face against his chest. He chuckled and pressed his hands flat against my back.
“You’re the perfect shape, Page. Don’t let anyone tell you different.” His finger found one of my stretch marks and he started tracing it. “You’ve got bumps and scars and sadness written all over you. I want to learn every single one.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to know you again.” His hand ran from my lower back, around my butt, and came to rest on my thigh. “Every part.”
It wasn’t that I was opposed to the idea. But our time together was limited. We had separate lives, having nothing to do with the other, and I didn’t see how this would work past these next few days. I’d lose him again but for some reason my mind wouldn’t let me fully process. My brain and heart were in denial. My body was following right along behind them.
Self-indulgence. Planet denial. I was existing in both and very ok with it.
“The reunion will be over in two days. That’s not enough time to learn anything.”
“Who says this’ll end when the reunion does?”
“Who says it won’t?” I whispered.
I looked up at him and he stared down at me. The lazy contentment on his face was replaced with intense seriousness. “I told you I’d stay. I promised.”
“We both know you can’t. You have a life that doesn’t include me and I—”
“I just got you back, Page. I never thought—I’m not giving you up over something as simple and pointless as distance.”
“I’m not back, Grady. I’m just here. For now. As are you.”
“You’re expecting this to end.”
“Aren’t you? Everything you say here, now, may not last past us getting out of this bed. Leaving this room. Going our separate ways.”
“You’re being ridiculous.”
“I’m being rational and reasonable. I’m thinking long term, not only what will happen in the next few seconds or minutes. I have to be responsible—”
“You’re acting as if being here, letting me back inside you, doesn’t matter. It does, Page. It matters a whole hell of a lot.”
“It’s called resolving our issues. Short term.”
“You think screwing me out of your system will do that? I hate to tell you this but it’s not going to work, not with us. We have a long list of issues that need to be resolved and one roll in the sack doesn’t even come close to covering it.” I hooked a leg over his hip and burrowed closer. He didn’t seem to mind and held me tighter. “I hurt you, I get that. It’s going to take time and me following through for you to even begin to believe what I say. But don’t think I’m not going to try. Because I am. I want this. I want you and I’m willing to earn it all back in order to have it.”
“I’m not sure if—”
He shifted closer and grabbed a hold of the back of my thigh just above my knee. Five points of pressure pulled my leg higher and tighter against him. I felt him between my legs growing thicker and longer. And my once silent, non-existent libido roared back to life.
“Grady.”
I tipped my face up and he kissed me, still knowing all my tells.
“I need inside of you again.” He moaned as I tried to get closer. “I need you to feel me.”
“Top?”
Grady rolled so I was under him and all it took was that shift of our bodies for him to notch into me. He kept his eyes fused with mine as he pressed my thigh against the bed, opening me up wider.
“Never?” he whispered before kissing me.
He didn’t move any further, not yet. Not until I told him he could. But at the moment, my mouth was busy trying to devour his. How I’d missed his kisses. He’d never kept them from me. If anything, he’d kissed me too much. Everyone else complained about all the PDA, bruised and swollen lips, bite marks, and us disappearing before shows to make out.
But me?
I never complained about any of it.
With my palm flat against the side of his throat, I could feel his heart racing. The little hairs on the back of his neck tickled my fingertips—
My hips jerked against him and he went in a fraction.
“Page,” he gasped against my lips.
“Open your eyes,” I whispered and bit his bottom lip. “Let me see.”
His eyes opened, revealing blown pupils, barely any blue, and they were focused solely on me. “The reaction’s the same. My dick sliding into you still feels like heaven.”
“Grady.”
“Tell me what you want, Page.”
I gripped his forearms and kissed him again. It was a fierce meeting of lips and tongues. Teeth. His knee notched against my thigh, allowing his hand to drift—
I moaned into his mouth when his feather light touch pressed against my clit.
“You’re starved for touch, aren’t you, baby? Is that what you want?”
He didn’t allow me to answer, just moved so he had some leverage with his knees. With one last kiss, he moved back. I whimpered at the loss and opened my eyes to see what he was doing.
He sat on his knees between my legs, my thighs spread and resting on his. He was still inside me that inch or so but he wouldn’t go any further. He was looking at my sprawled body like I was a buffet and it had me restless and self-conscious.
“Never?” he asked with a cocked eyebrow.
I wanted to kick him in the face but his name was all I managed to say.
“Thought so.” He ran his palms up my thighs and they jerked. “You’re neglected.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat and lost to the urge not to cover up. I squeezed my hands onto fists and folded my arms over my chest. He wanted an answer to his statement but I remained silent. We weren’t talking about this. We were not going to talk about this. He noted the tucking of my arms and how tightly fisted my hands were under my chin. We were going to end up talking about this.
“He didn’t look at you either, did he?”
I turned my head away to stare at the wall. Nope and despite Grady’s intentions, he wasn’t doing much better.
He sighed. “You always did have body image issues. Those scars run deep.”
Why was he talking about this? Now wasn’t the time—
His fingertips danced up my thighs, skipping over the good part in my opinion, and started tracing one of my barely visible stretch marks. Those I didn’t want to talk about on any level. But knowing Grady, he was going to push my buttons and break down all my walls. Leaving me bare and defenseless.
The not so strange thing was, I wanted him to try.
“I meant what I said earlier.”
“Which part?” I turned back to look at him but he was busy studying the mark. “Grady—”
“All of it. I want to relearn every inch of you. Including your mind and everything that’s happened since we—I left.”
“Promises, promises.”
“Let’s start—” He leaned over, gathered me in his arms, and hauled me up. The fact he kept picking me up and moving me around was a turn on. I wasn’t afraid to admit that. It was only made better by the feel of him between my legs and the sudden urge to sheath him.
“Always,” I whispered, unable to take it anymore. “Grady Sinclair, always.”
“Not yet.” He groaned, the only outward sign this was affecting him too. “Not yet.”
“Well, then, can you at least—?” He kissed me, leaving his lips to linger against mine. “You’re torturing me.”
“I’m getting you comfortable in your skin again. You’ve been hiding it for too long. And as much as I’d like to sink into you right now, we need to work on this lack of self confidence you’ve got going on.”
“You’re going to give me a complex.”
“Baby.” He kissed me again, slow and seductive, and I could feel his smile. “The only complex I’m giving you is a good one.”
“Yeah?” I wrapped my arms around his neck. “For how long?”
His eyes shinned up at me, knowing what I was asking. How he replied would be pivotal, maybe even ruin the timeline he’d come up with in his head. Was he going to work out my issues or screw me senseless. I saw it in his eyes the second he decided. Fuck it all to hell.
“Never.”
It was a whispered benediction he made good on well into the morning.
*
I woke up to the bright sun and Grady’s long fingers running across the roman numeral dates on my shoulder. His chest was my pillow; not exactly a comfortable one as my cheek was stuck to his skin. But it was nice to wake up to his smell and the feel of him next to me again.
He was still here. I was still here.
There was nothing to complain about yet.
I tilted my head up to look at him and found him far away. Back in college, I’d imagine stars in his eyes when he did this, when he thought about something else other than the here and now. All I saw now was rain. Nothing sparkly or hopeful about it.
Sadness, despair, misery. Anger. All of them were directed inward, self descriptive.
“Grady.”
His fingers stopped moving for a second, acknowledging I was awake, but the rain continued to fall. It was a torrential downpour. He didn’t say anything, just covered my hand where it lay on his stomach and gripped it. Hard. It took time to shake off the melancholy but I didn’t interrupt his process or push. There were countless mornings I had to do the same thing. I got through it. I had to trust he would too.
“She didn’t want kids,” he murmured. “Before we got married, we discussed it and agreed not having any was ok. It wasn’t a big thing. I wasn’t—inclined to have children either. After the childhood I had—” he shook his head “—I signed up for my future. Any children I had with her wouldn’t have a choice and I didn’t want to be an absentee father like mine was. It’s not what I wanted for any child of mine.”
I swallowed. “But?”
“After a while, I changed my mind. I saw Carrington and Emory building families—I wanted a home to come back to when touring was done. I wanted a family waiting for me or to come along on tour, you know?” I nodded, unable to speak past the lump in my throat. “I often found the house empty when I got back or a raging party in full swing with people flowing out of every entrance. The parties had nothing to do with me even though she’d swear different. I started staying at Carrington’s house more and more when we got back to town. Their house was warm and welcoming where mine felt temporary, like somewhere to stay between gigs. I signed it over in the divorce. No point in keeping it when the place didn’t feel like mine.”
“Did you even like the house when you bought it?”
He shrugged. “She liked it so I bought it for her. There was nothing personal of mine there so it wasn’t like pulling teeth to give it up. All my crap stayed boxed up and in storage. Never got a chance to do otherwise and when I think about it, I didn’t want to open it up. Go through it. Find places to put my things. Deep down, I didn’t want it. Not with her. She didn’t feel like home.”
“You need a home, Grady.”
“A house doesn’t make a home, baby. It’s the people who make it special. Did you know Karen keeps the group pictures from the dorm on the wall?”
I found that rather interesting. “I have the freshman year photograph on my wall. My kids think it’s awesome.”
“Yeah?”
I looked up at him but he was still staring out the window. Not quite here yet. “Happier times.”
“You’re not in the sophomore one.”
“I was with you.” My voice was quiet but even I could tell there was a smile in it, some sadness too. “Trying to help you cram for a final you swore you’d fail.”
A ghost of a smile lit his face, chasing some of the rain away. “You got frustrated with me and you never got frustrated with me.”
“I thought you’d go bald. You kept running your hands through your hair and tugging. In the end you kept your locks and passed the exam. Miracle.”
“The execs convinced me to cut it.” He lifted his hand off mine and rubbed at the close-cropped state of his hair. “Said it was better for the band’s image. Now, I can do what I want but getting it cut became a habit.”
“I’ve missed it. You were cute with longer hair.”
His fingers went back to brushing at the numbers. “You’ve kept an eye on me.”
“It got too hard not to. Sometimes I swore I saw your face everywhere I went. So I decided to desensitize myself.”
“You were nowhere.” I moved my hand off his stomach and tucked it against my chest as he talked. “I saw the world through sunglasses. Best way I can describe it. Everything was dull and tinged with dark. Nothing was bright. Until I was on stage. Then everything was lit up. When I was standing there in the spotlight, I’d look. Sometimes I thought I’d see but—” He shook his head. “It wasn’t true.”
“You thought I’d be there.”
“I should’ve known better but I couldn’t help it. I’d hoped you’d hear the songs, listen to the lyrics, and come watch us play. But you didn’t and I couldn’t blame you. Didn’t stop my insides from fluttering before every show and my chest squeezing painfully tight when it was over.” He paused to take a breath and maybe decide if he wanted to tell me more. I was thankful when he did. “I’d have this dream sometimes. It’d be the last song of the night and I’d be sitting acoustic, dripping with sweat, tired. Ready for it to be over despite the adrenaline high. It always happens in the middle of the song, always. Tingling in my spine would set me on edge, awareness making me so lit up I’d feel like I could sense everything. I’d look up, see the crowd swaying, and then there you’d be. Stage left, dressed the same way as the last night we were together. Tight jeans, my day old shirt you’d slept in knotted at the small of your back, and those ridiculous hoop earrings. I’d keep playing because I had to—but the second I finished and begin to walk over, you’d be gone. Like smoke. I’d wake up in a cold sweat, the ghost of the song following me out. It takes forever to shake.”
“What’s the song?”
He shook his head. “Doesn’t matter.”
The song had meaning for both of us and he wasn’t in the mood to talk about it. We dropped into silence and I fought the urge to push him for more. I thought of something else instead. Something that wouldn’t make him feel better but it was something he needed to know anyway.
“I had tickets once. Won them from a contest the local radio station hosted. Sterling wanted to come with me but I told her I had to do it on my own. She helped me get ready. I drove myself. Found my seat. And I waited.”
His fingers stopped moving. “Wait.” I looked up and all it took was a second for him to piece it together. “Those contests are always VIP.” The rain stopped and he tore his eyes from the window to look at me. “It would’ve included a meet and greet after the show. You said you never listened to the music.”
“I haven’t. I stayed through the opening act. I thought I could do it, finally listen to what made you famous. To what made you leave. I thought it would clue me in to what happened, tell me why. The whole time I sat there, I swore I could feel you. It was like when we were back at college and I knew if you were in your room or not because I could sense you. The opening act ended and the roadies came on stage to swap out the gear. Emory’s bass and Carrington’s drums. Then I saw it. They set out your acoustic and I knew I couldn’t do it. So I left before you even came out on stage, before I could hear your voice. I ran and I didn’t look back.”
“You were scared.”
I pushed and sat up next to him against the headboard. I made sure my arm was pressed up against his, needing the contact. “I was afraid you’d reject me again. I didn’t want to hear how happy you were. I saw it in the pictures and the ads, I didn’t want to hear it too.”
He reached over and took my hand, linking his fingers with mine. “I wasn’t happy, Page. Content, yes, but not happy.”
“You’re not happy now?”
“No and neither are you. Come here.” He let go of my hand and lifted his arm, meaning for me to rest against his side. I moved in, got comfortable. “Better?”
“It’s not worse.”
His hand went back to the roman numerals and I waited, knowing it was coming at some point. His curiosity wasn’t something he tended to keep quiet. What he wanted to know, though, I had to control. My children were the one thing about me that stuck out in everyone’s minds. They also tended to be the biggest mystery because I didn’t like to talk to them. Everything I had with them was precious and I wasn’t one to share.
But with Grady—
“Brett likes to draw,” I whispered before he could ask. “The last conference I had with his teacher, she told me he was on target for everything but drawing—he was way ahead of his peers. She suggested I look into a program for him over the summer. He drew me this really weird doodle thing before I left and refused to let go of my leg until I promised to take it with me.”
“He held on to your leg?”
I smiled, couldn’t help it. When it came to my little people, smiling was constantly on the agenda. “Yeah. He had me in a death grip. I lost circulation in my big toe for a couple of seconds.” To share or not to share. “There’s this girl that lives across the parking lot in one of the townhouses. She was in his class. He doesn’t pay her much attention but I’m pretty sure she has a crush on him.”
“Why?”
“According to Brett, she’s flung her hair in his face multiple times.”
I didn’t look up to see it but I knew he was smiling. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“It’s a girl thing. She was trying to get his attention. When he got a haircut, she was the only one who noticed and told him it looked nice. Then we were walking past her door one morning and she comes barreling out full tilt and says, “I know him! It’s Brett!””
“What did he do?”
“Kept walking. Acted like he didn’t hear her. I think he hurt her feelings.”
It started out as a bubble and then a chuckle, until he was full on laughing, shaking us both.
“Oh my god. That’s too funny.”
“I know. But that’s Brett. Completely oblivious unless it’s Legos or his latest favorite movie.”
“He likes Legos?” Grady’s eyes brightened. “Does he like Lincoln Logs too?”
I frowned. “I don’t think he’s ever played with Lincoln Logs.”
“Never?” I shook my head and he looked aghast. “Page. Lincoln Logs are essential to a little boy’s childhood.”
I snorted, finding this quite amusing. “Do they even make Lincoln Logs anymore?”
He looked very insulted. “Course they do! They’re Lincoln Logs.”
“Are we seriously talking about kids toys right now?”
“Well, we could discuss adult toys but I’m pretty sure you’d balk at the subject.”
“You’d be correct.”
“Thought so.” He kissed my head. “Tell me something else.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Anything. What else do they like? What about—”
Anxiety boiled deep inside, making me nervous and on edge. “You don’t want to hear me talk about them.”
“They’re a part of you, Page. A big part. Not the only part but they’re important.” He traced the top date a couple of times before saying, “Harlow? Why’d you pick it?”
“What about Harriet?”
I frowned. “Harriet?”
“Yeah. Like Harriet the Spy. It was my great grandmother’s name. I kinda like it.”
“Why are we talking about this?”
“Because one day we’re going to have kids and we should talk about it.”
“Kids, huh? Are you carrying them?”
He laughed and squeezed my hand. “No. You’re the woman, you’ll carry them and you’ll be beautiful while doing it. I’m going to shower you with affection and love—”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re out of your mind.”
I started walking again but he stopped me. “Page Townsend, I’m serious. You’ll be even more gorgeous than you are now and it’ll be awesome because I’ll know I put the little music note in there.”
“Music note?”
He nodded. “Better than watermelon seed.”
“I don’t like Harriet.”
He nodded. “What about you?”
“I like Winslow. It was my grandfather’s name.”
“Ahh—” he shook his head “—too stuffy.”
“And Harriet isn’t?”
He thought about it and realized I was right. “We’ll just have to come up with something else.”
I traced the curve of his pectoral muscle, trying to come up with the right explanation. One that didn’t reveal too much but placated what he wanted to know.
“I wanted something different. A name that wasn’t generic or common enough for there to be two in a class. It took some convincing but when it came down to it, young girl who’s a cranky pregnant person wins out.” I took a deep breath and let it all out. “It was my way of coming to terms with the past.”
I rolled out of his arms and sat up, facing away from him. Space. Everything was getting a bit too heavy. I needed space.
“Come to terms with the past? What do you mean?” I didn’t answer and he was forced to take it or piss me off by pushing the subject. Considering neither of us were revealing more than we were comfortable sharing, I wasn’t surprised when he didn’t insist on an answer. “Was he—is he—a good dad?”
“He’s fine.” My shoulders hunched. “With Harlow, he did the whole sympathetic pregnancy thing, gained twenty pounds.” My heart squeezed painfully in my chest. Getting too close. “By that time, Sterling and I had an apartment so I stayed until I had her. I wanted to keep my life normal as long as possible. Not to mention it felt—wrong to move in with someone else. None of it felt right anyway but—” I ran out of words. “When Harlow asks me if she’s smart I tell her yes because she’s already attended college-level classes.”
I meant it as a joke but the sad tone of my voice ruined it. I grabbed the folded up throw from the end of the bed and wrapped it around myself. My instincts were screaming for me to run. And in a way, I knew it was time to go. We’d lingered too long in this cocoon and someone was bound to come knocking. At this point, I wasn’t sure if I wanted anyone to know we’d picked up old habits and it didn’t occur to me until then that Emory might’ve already noticed.
“Why does she ask you that?”
“She’s special.” I glanced around the room for my clothes. “I didn’t notice something was up until she was three and even then I thought it would work itself out. Instead of saying full, normal words, she was babbling. I thought it was because she still used a pacifier but—” I shook my head “—they didn’t label her until she was in kindergarten and by the time they got around to finishing the testing, it was almost the end of the school year. So she had to repeat. Considering she already had to spend an extra year at home because of when her birthday fell, she was severely behind her age group. Sometimes she gets it in her head she’s not smart and I have to reassure her. I don’t have a problem with it but I worry it’s done some damage to her self esteem.”
“But she’s ok now?”
I covered up all the fun bits and got up from the bed. “She’s fine.”
“You’re not telling me something.”
“There’s a lot I’m not telling you.” My ankle still twinged a bit but I ignored it. “Where are my—”
“Panties?” I twirled to face him. “Hid them while you were sleeping. Along with all your other clothes.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Why?”
“I didn’t want you leaving without my knowing it. I knew you’d do this. Get close and then draw away. It’s your classic behavior, along with denial and withdrawal. Considering what happened before, I don’t blame you. I deserve the cold shoulder and a hell of a lot more but—”
“They’re my children, Grady. You don’t get to know about them.”
“I’m getting close to a subject you don’t want to talk about.”
“My whole life is a subject I don’t want to talk about. Just like yours except I don’t have a PR department handling what the world knows about me. My kids—”
“Are beautiful. Just like their mother. As I knew they would be.”
“Why are you bringing this up?” I whispered. “Why does it matter?”
“Because even though it has no meaning for you, I’m glad you have them to make you smile. It means you’re less alone—”
I shook my head and tried not to cry. “You don’t know anything. I don’t feel less alone, Grady. I feel more alone than I’ve ever felt. Why the hell does no one see that?”
“You’re not alone, Page.”
“It sure as hell feels like it.” To share or not to share take two. “I’ve been alone since I was a child. And then you—you blew into my life making it all change only to rip it away when you left. It didn’t get any better. He was there with Harlow but—I was on my own with Brett. The whole time I was pregnant, it was all on me. And then after he was born, I was alone in the hospital with him. I was alone for months after I brought him home. Even before things ended, I was alone. I did it all by myself. Being alone has become a constant state of being for me and that’s not going to change. Not ever.”
“How—he wasn’t there? Where—?”
I waved him off and started to look for something suitable to wear. A t-shirt, maybe a pair of his pants even if I couldn’t button them because his hips were narrower than mine. I should’ve listened to Emory last night when he suggested I bring a change of clothes. Then again, Grady might’ve hidden those too.
“Page. Answer me, please.”
I found a shirt in one of the drawers, pulled it over my head and discarded the blanket, then turned to face him. He stood there, naked, with angry narrowed eyes and I couldn’t help but find my irritation lessen a bit. I liked that he was angry for me but at the same time, the way he was feeling was pointless. It was in the past and nothing about it could change.
“Exactly what I said.”
“He knocked you up and then left? Where was he?”
“My life hasn’t been sunshine and roses, Grady. Things happened—”
“Where. Was. He?”
I hated when people asked for more details. How do you explain there is more to someone being there than just their proximity to you? “He was there but at the same time he wasn’t.”
“What does that mean?”
“He had this theory. If he wanted a boy, he had to put distance between us emotionally, physically. Sleep in separate beds, make me feel like shit. Stuff like that. Turns out he was right.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Imagine looking at someone every day and all you see is a lack of empathy. Just an uncaring passive aggressiveness that has no end. When you try to hold their hand, they won’t let you touch them and the worst part is when they don’t want to touch you either. Then imagine being pregnant while all this is happening. The most emotional time in a woman’s life. Probably hard for you to imagine but—”
I stopped my roll when I saw the look on his face. He’d gone from anger to a sad understanding only someone in my position could understand.
“She used to look at me the same way.” He’d looked away while I was talking and I thought it was so he could hide how he was feeling. It was for a whole different reason. The rain was falling again. “My ex-wife—she stopped looking. Stopped seeing. It’s how a lot of people look at me.” Then he met my eyes. “You looked at me the same way when I first saw you. Then I noticed something different about how you viewed me. There was an empty brokenness to it instead of blankness. You were like me and its how I knew you weren’t completely lost. I could reach you and maybe if I did, I could reach myself too.”
“I’d love to tell you you’re right but I don’t think you are.”
“That’s because you don’t know how you look at me. You don’t see it because you’re not on the receiving end.”
My words spit back at me. But not in a malicious way. “That’s—”
“You’re not going to ruin this. Not by delivering a rebuttal or by pretending you don’t know what I’m talking about. No more lies, Page. No more hidden truths. No more running—”
“I’m not the one who runs, Grady. You are. Every time.”
“And I promise you—”
“No.” I took an aggressive step toward him. Unable to stand still anymore because of how much I was feeling. Hope, fear, mistrust. “You promised me last time and you left. You didn’t come back. You never came back. You’re not even back now—”
“Neither are you,” he snapped. “We’re both stumbling around in the dark, looking for something to light the way. But you know what? I feel you too. I can sense you like you can sense me. And that—that is something to hold on to.”
“You’re here for the reunion, Grady, and then you’ll be gone again. You being here has nothing to do with me.”
“I could give a shit about the reunion,” he gritted out through clenched teeth. “This may come as a surprise but the band is here for one reason. To see you again. I’m not the only one who missed you.”
“You do realize Hush hates me. If he had his way, you’d fuck my brains out and be done with it. Carrington could give a shit; he has Karen. And she—” Karen and I had issues. Issues I didn’t want to think about. “So, forgive me if I don’t believe that.”
“You put us together, Page. Chance Encounters wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for you. It’s true despite how everyone left, how it all looks.”
“I didn’t put you together—”
“You helped us, believed in us. Not to mention finding Emory. He turned into a dopey mess when he found out you’d be here.”
“And how did you know I would be here? Stalk the registry, have an inside man? Sterling? I don’t think it was her. She’s not fond of you.”
“Butler was approached about us doing some stuff for the reunion. We all said no at first. The possibility of coming back here was like a sledge hammer to the head for all of us. None of us wanted to do it. Emory changed his mind first. Then Carrington and Karen. They wanted to come back to the campus, see the old hangouts. At least that was the excuse they gave Hush and I. I didn’t know what was going on until Butler—he told me there was a chance you’d be here. I knew—it was like a sign from the universe or God or fate. I had to come. I had to see you again. Something inside of me said once I got here, it would all make sense. All the bad shit: my nasty divorce, Hush’s substance problems, Emory getting screwed over by his ex-wife. It would all make sense if I came here.”
“And does it? Is it all clear now?”
The rain was still falling but his eyes were unnaturally clear.
“I’m looking at you. You’re standing there in my t-shirt, nothing else, and you’re all I see. All I want to do is—”
“What?”my voice was low, responding to his words and the way he was looking at me.
He began approaching me, slow as if he was afraid to scare me away.
“I want to kiss you like you’re the last girl I’ll ever kiss. I want to touch you and watch as it lights you up. I want to lie on top of you and feel you writhe underneath me because you love the feel of me as much as I do you. I want to sink inside you and stay there because it makes me feel—alive.” His voice cracked. “I’ve been dead for years and you’ve sparked me back to life. I don’t want anyone else. I don’t need anything else. I’ll give it all up, the money, the fame, the music, if I can have one more taste of you.”
He stopped in front of me and I stared at his chest. I was afraid of what his eyes would tell me.
“It was a mistake,” he murmured. “Leaving. Believing I had to choose between you and my future. Because it wasn’t just my future. It was yours too and I—I took it from you when I left.”
He cupped my face with one hand and his thumb stroked across my cheek. Wetness smeared over my skin. I hadn’t realized I was crying. I was doing my best to stand still in case all of this shattered and turned out to be false. No room for knowing if my tear ducts were working.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry for being stupid. For being immature. I’m sorry for not believing and understanding I could keep you too. I’m sorry for sacrificing our never always. Page, I’m just really fucking sorry for everything. I want to fix it. I want to make it up to you. I want to believe in ‘better late than never’. I want you to believe it too.”
I wrapped my hand around his wrist, felt his heartbeat. “I want to believe you and part of me does.”
“But?”
“The rest of me wants to be stubborn.”
“I don’t think that’s it.”
I stared at the tattooed star on his arm. “Then what is it?”
“The rest of you expects me to go and never come back. Again. You’re preparing for self-preservation. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re already there.”
“We’re flawed,” I joked. “How do we fix that? Can we fix it? I don’t think we can.”
“When we’re together, baby, anything is possible.”
~*~
Music Selection: Unbreakable - Jamie Scott, Photograph - Ed Sheeren, Like I Can - Sam Smith