by L. D. Davis
Leo laughed and then backed up a few steps with his hand up in surrender. “Okay, okay. I’m sorry.”
I huffed out a sigh and continued the cleanup. Leo’s phone rang from the bedroom. He left to go answer it while I disposed of the wet paper towels. His offer was…enticing. I had never really explored Miami before, so it would be kind of cool to do that. I could also take him up on one part of his offer regarding his home, and work there, right in that corner with the beautiful view. I’d get so much writing done with a view like that to settle my mind, but I wouldn’t stay there at night. Staying would be so dangerous, that was made clear by the way we woke up that morning, tangled and…comfy…
Leo had returned before I had time to think about it anymore. He put his mug in the sink next to mine and then leaned against the counter.
“So, will you stay?” he asked, crossing his arms across his chest.
“If I say yes, there are some parameters we need to establish…”
One of his eyebrows raised slightly, but he said nothing as he waited for me to elaborate.
“I will stay in a hotel, not here,” I said, tapping one finger. “But I will use your grand view of the ocean to work while you’re working, if that’s okay.”
He nodded once.
“Second, I can’t promise exactly how long I’ll stay. I have a lot of traveling coming up soon. We’ll have to take it one day at a time.”
He looked a little more reluctant to concede, but he did nod again, slowly.
“Okay,” I exhaled before moving on to my second parameter. “You and I…we have…a complicated history, but I want to be clear, Leo…it can’t…I can’t…”
He narrowed his eyes. “You’re still stuck on that girl code shit that you and Leslie came up with when you were like five?”
“We were thirteen,” I said, a little defensively. “And it isn’t shit. It’s—”
“It’s shit,” Leo said, tilting his head slightly. “I understand the premise of the code. Really, Tabs, I do. I get it, but in real life people can’t help who they lo—”
Damn it! It was almost an exact repeat of the argument we had nine years ago!
“Leo!” I didn’t want him to say that word, not in that conversation. “Either you live with that…or don’t and I’ll leave today. We’re friends, okay? We were really good friends a long time ago, but there is a reason why we haven’t spoken all of these years and I honestly don’t want to repeat that. I didn’t like it either, okay? But your friendship really does mean a lot to me, so can we just have that? Our friendship?”
There was an angry twitching in Leo’s jaw, though he tried to keep his face neutral. “You’re asking me to forget about my own feelings, Tabitha.”
Jeez, how did we even get into this crazy ass conversation?
“Leo, it’s been nine years, as you keep pointing out. I’m not the same girl I was back then. Parts of me are still the old Tabitha, but there’s so much more of me that isn’t; and even though you still have asshole tendencies, I’m sure you’ve changed a lot, too. You don’t know me like you used to, so any feelings you may have are for someone that doesn’t even exist anymore.”
He sighed heavily, wearily as he looked down at the floor. After several silent seconds, he looked at me again.
“I want you to stay, Tabitha,” he said. “If you’ll be more comfortable at the hotel, fine. But…” He pushed away from the counter and he was suddenly in my space again. He didn’t touch me, but I felt him anyway. His body heat, his breath on my face, and the weight of his emotions.
“I know you, Tabitha. I know you deep down. No matter who else you become, I will always know you.”
He stepped away from me and headed toward the hallway that lead to the bedrooms. “I’ll see you at the beach in a couple of hours, and tonight we’ll go out.”
He flashed me a small smile and disappeared down the corridor.
I found my lungs and breathed again.
Chapter Twelve
“Did you get any PP?” Sandy asked me later in the afternoon when she called me.
“Hi, San,” I said as I pulled a brush through my hair. “How was your flight home?”
“Uneventful. Did you get any PP?”
“I’m fine, San. Thanks for asking.”
“Did you get any Pesciano Pecker?” she demanded, her patience gone.
“No, I didn’t get any of the Pesciano Pecker,” I said, laughing lightly. “Did you have a Rob Sammich?”
“Shut up,” she said and I laughed again. “So, what happened last night after I left? Did you go to his house? Did you hang out? Did he finger you?”
“What?” My mouth fell open, and I didn’t even know why I was surprised. Sandy always said stuff like that.
“He has nice looking fingers, right? Like his nails are always well trimmed so he won’t scratch the hell out of your cootch.”
“You know, it’s really hard to believe that you are a news anchor,” I said, shaking my head.
“Come on, give me something, Tabitha! Stop keeping me in suspense. I can’t take it! I have to be on air in an hour. Give me something to be happy about, to counteract the messed up news stories I have to read tonight.”
Watching the news was often traumatizing, I couldn’t even imagine having to read it out loud every day, a few times a day. However, I wasn’t really interested in telling her about the conversations I had with Leo last night, or explaining where I slept and how I woke up. I was still processing all of that.
“We’re going to dinner tonight,” I said, deciding that was enough information to sate her curiosity.
“That’s it? That’s all you’re telling me?” Sandy asked in disbelief.
“We talked a lot,” I said vaguely. “I don’t know what you’re expecting to hear.”
“I want to hear dirty, dirty things.”
“Sorry to disappoint, slut brain. What’s on the news tonight?”
Sandy groaned, but told me what was happening in the world. I lay down on the bed after we hung up, promising myself that I would only lay there for a few minutes. I was still exhausted. I hadn’t slept all that much at Leo’s, and the nap I had tried to tackle when I returned from his house eluded me. I spent a couple of hours on the beach with Leo and a group of our old friends before returning to the room to get ready for dinner, but I felt like the sun had zapped the last of my energy.
My phone chimed, indicating I had a message.
How about takeout and a movie at my place tonight? We’re both tired.
I almost kissed my phone.
Perfect! I’ll drive over. Want me to bring anything?
I waited only a few seconds for his response.
Just your beautiful self.
I bit back a smile. Moments later, I found the will to get off of the bed. I changed out of the dress I had put on for dinner and put on a pair of cotton shorts and another nerdy T-shirt. This one said “BOOKGASM!” across the front. I stopped off at a store on my way. Leo told me not to bring anything, but I knew he would like what I was getting.
When he opened the door a little while later, he looked at my shirt with amusement before his eyes traveled to the object around my neck. Leo laughed loud and deep as his fingers curved under the candy necklace I was wearing.
“I brought one for you, too.” I held up the little package.
“Best gift ever,” he said, taking the candy from me. He stepped aside to let me in before wrapping his arms around me in an embrace as if he hadn’t just seen me a couple of hours before. He kissed my temple and then led me into the kitchen. “What kind of food are you in the mood for? Besides candy necklaces.”
“Pizza is fine.”
Leo took a bite out of his newly acquired jewelry. “I’ll order. You go over and pick out a movie or two.”
I yawned as I strolled over to the shelves of movies. What I really wanted to pick out was a mattress to crash on.
Leo joined me in searching for a movie after he ordered our d
inner. We argued over what movie to watch for a half hour. He even asked the poor pizza guy for his opinion. Leo’s movie collection was significant and had every genre except porn.
“Where’s all of your porn?” I asked, looking at him with disappointment.
He looked rather insulted. “Just because I’m a guy doesn’t mean I have a stash of porn somewhere.”
“It isn’t because you’re a guy,” I said snatching the movie he had chosen and putting it back on the shelf.
“Right. Like you have a stash of porn.” He ate some of the candy from his perfect, portable snack. He offered me a bite even though I was wearing my own. My neck was already sticky. I didn’t take a bite, but I pulled on his necklace and let it snap back to his neck.
“Maybe I do have a porn stash.” I shrugged and plucked a different movie off of the shelf. “How about this one?”
“No,” he said to the movie I held. “I think you’re lying. I don’t know too many women who would admit to watching porn, let alone owning it, and sorry, baby, you’re not one of the ones I’d suspect.”
“Wow,” I said, shaking my head. “See, this goes back to the whole you don’t know me like you used to know me argument.”
“There’s no argument,” Leo stated dismissively. “I know you deep down and will always know you, like I said.”
“Well, you fail.” I snorted. “Because I totally own a collection of porn.”
Leo looked at me suspiciously.
“Why would I make that up?” I laughed. “Like I would try to impress you. How about this movie?”
His eyes widened and he laughed. I smugly looked away and let him have his giggles.
“So...what kind of porn are you into?” he asked.
“Whoa,” I held up my hands to make him slow his roll. “You haven’t even confirmed or denied the existence of yours.”
“I don’t have one,” he said, shrugging.
I gave him a rueful look. “Yeah, right.”
“I don’t, unless you include your books.”
I punched his arm as he laughed. I picked up another movie. “What about this one?”
“Deal.” He grinned. He pulled on my necklace and took a bite of my candy.
“You have your own perfect, portable snack,” I admonished, smacking his hand away. He released it and it snapped moistly against my neck.
“Yeah, but eating your candy is so much more enjoyable,” Leo said in a tone that implied he was not talking about the candy around my neck.
We soon settled on the couch with a bowl of popcorn and bottles of water. I must have been pretty wiped out. Before the movie was even half over, I fell asleep. I woke up with my head in Leo’s lap. One of his arms was slung possessively over my body. He was sleeping, too, snoring softly with his head tilted back on the couch. I was feeling pretty groggy, but I had to pee. I tried to be careful not to wake him as I untangled myself from his arm, but he woke up anyway. He looked up at me with sleepy eyes.
“You’re leaving?” He sounded disappointed.
“Bathroom,” I said and tried to step over him, but he pulled me down into his lap. I was immediately uncomfortable, worried about my weight, but Leo seemed unfazed as he pressed his face into my neck.
“Promise you won’t leave,” he murmured sleepily.
I couldn’t leave if I wanted to, not unless someone was going to drive me back to my hotel and carry me to bed. I was that exhausted, but I made Leo sweat a bit while I pretended to think about it for a few seconds.
“I’ll stay,” I answered finally. I then unlocked his arms and got up. “In the guest room. Alone.”
I opened my eyes many hours later and sighed.
“I am pretty sure that I came into this room and got into this bed alone last night,” I said.
“The pillow I hug at night doesn’t snore, so I needed something, or someone, that does,” Leo responded sleepily.
“Then you should have just hugged yourself.”
“Yeah, but I like to share.”
“You are always invading my personal space,” I said, shaking my head.
He chuckled softly, the warm air bursting onto my neck. “Yeah,” he agreed unapologetically.
I was lying on my back. Leo had me trapped and practically pinned me to the bed with one of his strong legs draped over my thighs, his arm over my midsection and his other one under my head. His chin rested softly on my shoulder. Every time he spoke or exhaled, I felt it on my neck, making the tiny hairs there stand on end.
My brain was insistent that I get out of bed, that what I was doing was wrong, but my body did not want to respond. My body was comfortable, fitting with Leo’s perfectly.
“Tell me about California,” Leo murmured.
“What about it?”
“How did you end up there? What was your life like there?” He paused and I felt a very slight tension enter his body. “You were engaged. Did you follow your fiancé there?”
I shifted slightly. Leo’s arms and leg tightened around me as if he expected me to bolt. Part of me wanted to. I knew that he understood that I had gone on with my life after he left, but I didn’t want to hurt him or myself by talking about Xander, and I couldn’t talk about California without talking about Xander.
“Xander was offered a position in San Francisco before we even graduated. I didn’t want to hold him back, so I insisted that he take it even though I knew a bicoastal relationship was going to be next to impossible. Michelle was moving to Cincinnati with her boyfriend and she had found a good job there. I couldn’t afford rent on my own, especially since my student job at the library would be going away after I graduated. I was going to have to move back home unless I worked my ass off at low-paying jobs until I found work. A couple of weeks after graduation, Xander officially accepted the job, and then he proposed and asked me to move to California with him.”
“Did you say yes because you really loved him and wanted him?” Leo asked as his body became more rigid. “Or was it convenient considering your circumstances?”
I sighed in exasperation.
“I’m not asking to be an asshole, but you have to admit that it sounds questionable,” Leo said. “The last thing you would want to do is go back to your parents’, and someone was basically offering to take you away from that, almost as far away as you could get.”
“I love Xander,” I started, but Leo’s head popped up and he stared down at me with a hardness in his eyes.
“Love? Presently? You still love him?”
Ugh. This is why I don’t want to have this conversation.
“I will always love him,” I said, looking Leo in the eyes. “He hasn’t done anything to earn my dislike. Do you want to hear the rest of the story or not?”
It took him a moment, but he nodded silently before going back to his previous position.
“Anyway,” I said patiently. “I love Xander and I wanted to be with him, but yes…the proposal did come at the right time. So, I moved to California with Xan, and we moved into this craptastic apartment near the airport. It was loud and smelly, but we made the best of it.”
“Were you happy?”
I hesitated. “Sometimes I was happy,” I admitted. “Most of the time I was just…content. Xander is a good guy, he always treated me well, and we had made a nice life together. We had friends, we always had something fun to do, and we were able to move out of that shitty apartment. I didn’t know that I was only content and not happy, not until later. I didn’t know that there was a difference.”
“When did you know the difference?” Leo asked, stroking my hair gently.
“The day we broke up,” I said quietly. “When he left me.”
“Why did he leave you? Was he cheating on you? Was there someone else?”
“No, like I said, Xander is a good guy and has never done anything to make me hate him or dislike him, but he had every right to dislike me.” I breathed in deeply and let it out quickly. “Basically, he left because he knew my heart wasn’t
in it, not all the way, not like his, and he was right. I just didn’t really see it until then.”
“So…” Leo hesitated, like he was searching for his next words. “Did you write Grind after that breakup?”
I was silent for a moment. “I wrote Grind in the spring of my second year of college,” I said, just above a whisper.
Leo stopped breathing for a long moment. When he started to breathe again, I felt his heart racing against me, and beating hard.
“That book was…raw,” Leo whispered. “It gutted me. Tamara’s emotions felt so damn real.”
“Because they were,” I whispered.
I pushed at him to get him off of me, and I was surprised when he moved easily. I got out of bed and left the room to lock myself in the bathroom for a few minutes.
It wasn’t easy admitting to Leo how badly I was hurting after he left all of those years ago. I never missed classes or missed work before, but I didn’t leave the apartment for days after that. I had so much hatred directed at myself, for betraying Leslie, for hurting Leo. I had sat down at my desk to write it out, to try to release some of the pain, and before I knew it, a whole story had formed, and three weeks later, Grind was finished. But it took me a couple of years before I was ready to even read it, and even then, I didn’t read it. I allowed an editor friend to read it instead, and that was the beginning of my writing career. But I still couldn’t read it without reliving that storm of emotions.
When I came out of the bathroom, I heard the shower running in Leo’s bedroom. I went into the guest room and made the bed and then went into the kitchen in search of a caffeine fix. Leo came out a little while later, hair damp from his shower, and dressed in a pair of black slacks and a black polo with Leo’s in gold lettering on the front pocket.
“Check you out,” I said, passing him a mug of coffee. “Mr. Casual business owner.”
“I make polo shirts look good.” He grinned before sipping his coffee.
I rolled my eyes. “Can you ever just take a compliment without being a conceited bastard?”
