Later on, after the last poem had been read, I headed to the Harley with a relentless nagging in my brain, reminding me that I hadn't read my poem. I had written it and wanted to read it, to release it and throw it away, but I hadn’t, in fear that Audrey would at once realize I was there and want to speak to me. But, I wanted her to. I wanted her to talk to me. Fuck, I wanted to talk to her, to ask my questions, to ask her out, to ask her into my bed, and ...
No. It was better she didn't. My life was too complicated, too busy, and consumed, and it would never work out well for anybody. Not me, and certainly not her. So, I hurried quicker and hoped to escape.
"Hey!"
It was her voice. That friendliness and airy lilt, threatening to turn on the light, and I took a glance over my shoulder. But she hadn't been talking to me. It was someone else, presumably one of her aforementioned cousins, and I breathed out the relief and breathed in the disappointment as I went to climb on the back of my bike and take off for Cee’s place.
***
“Jesus, Blake,” Cee groaned in protest, and I rolled to the side, unable to hide my frustration. “Aggressive, much?”
“Sorry,” I muttered with defeat, sitting up and draping my arms over my knees.
“What’s up with you tonight?” She lit a cigarette to add to the scent lingering in her sheets and in her hair. I never liked the smell of cloves and smoke much, and maybe that was another reason we would never have more than the occasional hook-up. But it was still so uniquely her, and I breathed in that smoke, finding comfort in knowing I was here. With Cee, and not back at the club with Audrey.
“Nothing,” I lied, not wanting to get into it.
“Yeah, okay,” she drawled around an eye-roll. “How many times have we slept together?”
“I don’t know,” I shrugged.
“Yeah, me neither,” she laughed lightly through her nose, “but it’s been enough for me to know you always get off, and tonight, you didn’t. So, what’s up?”
I didn’t want to get into it. There was no reason to, and what the hell would I say, anyway? That seeing the chick with the butterfly tattoo had shaken me up so thoroughly, I couldn’t come? It was absurdly pathetic, not to mention completely uncharacteristic of me to let something so meaningless bother me, so I merely lifted a hand and waved it flippantly.
“It’s just been a long week, I guess,” I said, offering her an explanation that wasn’t entirely a fabrication of the truth. “I thought this would help me relax, but I guess not.” I glanced over my shoulder at her with her dreadlocks fanned out against the pillow. I mustered a smile and added a genuine, “Sorry.”
Clipping my shoulder with her knuckles, she replied, “Hey, you still got me off, so there’s nothing for you to be sorry for,” and she laughed.
“You’re welcome,” I drawled, chuckling.
“Maybe you just need to sleep. I mean, when was the last time you got some really, really great sleep?”
I shook my head. “I don’t even know.”
Her hand laid against my shoulder and her clawed fingers squeezed gently. The touch was that of a friend and I found a gentle comfort in it as I sighed. “Then maybe that’s all you need.”
“Maybe,” I replied, nodding and wishing it was that easy.
“Anyway, um, I actually wanted to talk to you about something,” she said, removing her hand from my shoulder.
No conversation starting that way ever went well. “Yeah?”
"I wanna start dating again,” she blurted out, finally putting the cigarette to her lips.
I shrugged and turned toward the door. “Okay. Good for you.”
“So, I'm no longer available for booty calls," she further explained before taking a puff and holding the smoke in her lungs.
Laughing, I shook my head. “Was tonight a parting gift or some shit?”
“God, no!” she shouted, voice strained by tense lungs, and clapped a hand over her mouth as she coughed, startled by the volume of her own voice and her eyes went wide. Lowering her hand slowly, she repeated in a hiss, “No. Jesus Christ, Blake, of course not.”
“I was kidding, Cee, it’s fine.”
"I'm sorry," she added quietly.
"Really. It's cool," I assured her, masking the sting of rejection with a chuckle.
"You know, maybe you should find someone, too," she suggested. "You're not getting any younger and you're a great guy. There's gotta be some little witch out there just dying to find her dark prince."
"Oh, yeah. They're just lining up," I chided sardonically. "But seriously, you know I can't make that shit work. I have too much going on and I can't focus on a relationship. Casual shit is best for me." Then I caught myself before I launched into a total pity fest. Before I could make her feel guilty for ending what we’d always known was a temporary thing. "But really, I'm good.”
“You sure?”
“Yes,” I stated firmly as I got out of bed to get dressed, unable to shake the loneliness that hung over me in the dark that had once felt so friendly.
Chapter Four
"HOW WAS YOUR weekend, Blake?" Dr. Travetti crossed her legs. She was rocking a yellow pantsuit today and with her tall, lean frame, it gave her the unmistakable resemblance of a pencil.
"It was okay."
"What did you do?" She laid her clipboard against her lap and tapped the end of the pen against the metal clip.
I shrugged, leaning forward to plant my elbows to my knees. "Cleaned the bike, called Celia—"
"Celia?"
"I've told you about Celia. She’s my friend. I work with her."
"I know," she said. "But why did you call her?"
"To hang out, I guess. Why?"
Dr. Travetti wasn't buying that bit of bullshit. She knew my history with Cee. "To hang out, or to have sex?"
I released a heavy sigh and shook my head. "Does this seriously matter right now?" She scribbled something onto the first sheet of paper and I lowered my brow with scrutiny. "What was that?"
"Just writing, Blake. Keep telling me about your weekend."
"No, I'm curious. What did you write?"
Laying the pen back down on the board, she folded her hands and leveled me with a glare. "Tell me something, Blake. Why did you immediately get defensive when I asked if you called Celia to have sex?"
"Because it's irrelevant, and none of your business."
"It was a simple question. An innocent one, at that."
"I don't know why the hell it matters if I call my friend for sex or not. It was a mutual agreement between us, and she doesn't want to anymore, anyway so—"
"Why doesn't she want to?"
I lifted a hand and dropped it angrily to the arm of the chair. "Once again, Doc, none of your business—”
“You brought it up, Blake.”
I groaned in reply. “Whatever,” I muttered dismissively, then added, “And if you really wanna know, she wants to start dating again, so that's the end of our thing."
"That bothers you," she assessed. "Did you want to date her?"
I scoffed and shook my head. "Hell no. Cee and I are friends and co-workers. That's all. Yeah, I mean, we hooked up every now and then, but there's nothing more than that between us."
"Then, what bothers you about her dating someone?"
I furrowed my brow. "I don't know."
"But it does bother you."
"Yeah, I guess it does a little,” I relented.
She waved a hand toward me. "Well, try to explain it to me."
I unburdened myself with a huff and pressed my back to the chair. "You know, Doc ..."
"Try, Blake," she encouraged gently. “You only bring these things up when I know you want to talk about them, so just try.”
Raking my fingers through my hair, I looked up to the ceiling and without a second thought, I began to speak. "I don't know. I guess maybe I feel a little rejected. A little frustrated, too. I thought we had a good thing going. I mean, we've been doing this shit for years. We al
ways kept the sex from getting between our work relationship and how rare is that? I don't even think Gus suspected anything. We kept that shit separate. But now, she decides she wants to date people, and I get it. She doesn’t wanna have to explain her fuck buddy to them, that’s fine, but what am I supposed to do? I know that makes me sound like a selfish prick, but I mean, seriously. It's not like we fucked regularly or anything, but every now and then, the mood struck, and we were there for each other. But now ..." I shrugged with defeat.
“Now you feel alone,” she finished for me.
“Yeah,” I concluded as my gaze traced the outline of crown molding. “I guess that’s it.”
"Are you jealous?"
Bringing my attention back to her, I laughed darkly. "Jealous? Of who?"
"Celia? Or … whoever she ends up dating?"
I laughed again. "Nah, I'm not jealous. I told you. I don't feel like that about her."
"No," Dr. Travetti said sternly. "I meant, are you jealous that she might have someone soon, and you don’t?”
"Hell no." I snickered, tipping my head back again.
"Why is that so hard to believe?"
"Because I don't want someone."
There was a long pause, too long, and I looked back to the good doctor to make sure she hadn’t disappeared altogether. What I found was Dr. Vanessa Travetti, pursing her pretty lips and assessing me for too many seconds longer than I would've liked. She was picking me apart, playing her mind games, and the longer she watched, the more I wanted to yell at her. But before I could speak, she finally asked, "Do you want to know what I think?"
"Not really," I snorted a bitter chuckle. "But sure. Hit me."
She smiled fondly. "I think you do want someone. I think you have spent a very long time forcing yourself into thinking you don't, whatever be the reason, but deep down, there's a part of you that craves affection. That's why you turned to Celia in the first place. She's the closest thing you've had to an actual girlfriend, and—”
“I’ve had girlfriends before, Doc.”
“When? In the time you’ve been seeing me?”
I shook my head, then shrugged. “I guess not since, uh … college, maybe? I don’t know.” I tried to conjure a vivid memory of my last girlfriend. She was a feisty little punk with a duo of tongue rings. Hot as fuck with a nice ass. But the moment she called my brother an idiot, I kicked her out of my car and out of my life.
“That’s a long time ago, Blake,” she answered gently. “And now that Celia is removing herself from serving that position in your life, I think you're realizing that you're going to miss it."
I barked with a laugh. "I turned to Celia because we were both horny as hell one night and we were both single. We were convenient for each other then, but now, we're not. She's got the opportunity to find someone, and I'm alone. It's always gonna be that way, so ... End of story."
Dr. Travetti lifted her head with intrigue. "Why did you say that?"
Why had I said it? I should've bitten my tongue. But then, wasn't this the very reason why I’d signed up for therapy in the first place? To talk to someone?
"Because." I brushed it off with a flip of my hand.
"Because why, Blake?"
"Because it's fucking true."
She nodded slowly. "Does this have to do with your brother?"
I gritted my jaw. "Don't bring him up again, Doc."
"But it does, doesn't it?"
"I don't know what you want me to say to that."
"I want you to tell me the truth. This is the safest place, Blake. I won't judge you."
"No, but you'll write some shit on your fucking clipboard, won't you?"
“I might.”
“Well, isn’t that the same thing?”
With an assertive smile, she picked up her board and tossed it gently across the coffee table to me. It landed in my lap and I furrowed my brow. "Now you have my clipboard. I have nothing to write on."
I hummed contemplatively. "Touché, Doc."
"Well?"
I read the lines she’d scribbled earlier. "Defensive when talking about Celia. Angry? Jealous?" I twisted my lips at the sight of those words. Seeing them written so plainly, in the good doctor’s pretty script, drove them like spears through my skin and they pierced my heart with their pointy little T’s and that arrowhead A.
"The truth is, Doc," I swallowed, resigning myself to speak a truth I never thought I'd utter aloud, "I’ve spent a long time being jealous of other people. Friends, relatives … It just felt really unfair, because you know, when I was a kid, shit was great, until it wasn’t, and I’d start to watch these TV shows and movies for an escape. I’d find myself feeling so ridiculously jealous of fuckin’ Ross Gellar, whose only real problem was whether Rachel was into him today or not. How pathetic is that?"
"Everybody does that, Blake. We all envision ourselves in scenarios foreign to us. The grass is always greener on the other side, or so they say—"
"Yeah, but see, Doc, for me? The grass is actually greener. It's bright and vibrant and fucking beautiful. I'm unbelievably jealous that Celia can go out and find herself a boyfriend. I mean, I'm happy as hell for her, wish her the best and all that, but I'm jealous that she doesn't have to worry about what her brother would think. How he'd react. If he'd throw a fit if something was set just a little off kilter in his life. Or ..." I wiped a hand over my mouth and shook my head. "Or fuck, what if the guy had a problem with her brother? What if this guy found out about him and ran for the fucking hills? Because that brother is a permanent fixture in her life, and she will have to care for him forever. That's not a choice she has, it's just the way it is, but that guy? He can leave. He can get as far away from it as he can, and he fucking should because dealing with that brother is exhausting and draining and so fucking consuming, never mind her parents, and …” My words floated away as I stared at her, lips parted and breathing hard.
"Something tells me we're not talking about Celia anymore." Dr. Travetti offered me a small albeit sympathetic smile.
I wiped a hand over my face and allowed myself to chuckle. "Wow, Doc. What the fuck was your first clue?"
***
"What'd you end up doing on Sunday?" Celia asked with trepidation. She stood at my station, hip checked and arms crossed, as I cleaned and got things set up for my first client.
"I hung around the house," I answered without missing a beat. My morning session with Dr. Travetti had left me jarred, open and vulnerable. But I wouldn't let Celia know about that. "How was your day?"
"Good. I actually had a date after my ex picked the kids up for dinner," she replied.
“Wow,” I muttered dryly. “You don’t waste any time, huh?”
Her cheeks pinked slightly. “Actually, I, uh, already had the date planned. I just hadn’t told you about it, ‘cause I—”
“Didn’t want me to be jealous?” I lifted a brow, uttering the inside joke I only understood after my session with the good doctor.
“Yeah, maybe.” Celia grimaced. “So, uh … Are you?”
“Nope,” I replied. Then for good measure, I added, “How did it go?”
“Great, actually.” The thrill of potential love pricked at the corners of her lips. She had never looked at me that way. Nobody ever had. "We went and saw the new Marvel movie, grabbed some dinner, and went back to his place to chill."
Chill was code for fuck, or at the very least, mess around. Even though I knew Celia in the biblical sense, knew what she sounded like in the heat of the moment, I noted that it didn't bother me in the slightest that she had been intimate with someone else. It felt marginally triumphant, knowing for certain that I didn't in fact want her, if there'd been any doubt in my mind at all.
"He a good guy?" I met her eyes with sincerity, and she smiled, nodding.
"He is. He's sweet. Divorced with two kids.”
I laughed. "Holy crap, Cee. You're divorced with two kids. If you guys get married, you could have some real Brady Bunch shit goin
g on."
"Oh, God," she groaned and rolled her eyes playfully. "I'm not even close to thinking about another marriage."
The front door jingled open and I stood up from my stool. "First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Cee with a baby carriage," I sang teasingly as I walked away.
"Shut your damn mouth! My tubes are tied!" Celia called back as I grinned to myself and entered the waiting area.
I'd been expecting my first client of the day, a guy named Felix, with a fondness for skulls. Another person who’d found my work through my Instagram account and had wanted something dark and gloomy permanently imprinted on their skin. That's who I had expected to find waiting on the old, brown leather couch, but who I found instead was a tall guy, about my height and with my shared affinity for black attire. Black, white, and shades of grey crawled from the collar of his jacket, covering his neck and creeping over the curve of his jaw and chin. He slid a pair of sunglasses off, revealing a small cross beside his left eye, and I watched as he took in the shots of art covering the walls.
"Hey, can I help you?" I asked, stuffing my hands into the pockets of my jeans.
The guy turned to face me and a cool smirk quirked his lips. He pointed toward a few of my more popular pieces and said, "This shit is absolutely sick. Yours?"
"Yeah, they're mine," I confirmed casually.
"So, you're Blake Carson." I nodded affirmatively in response and he stepped forward, hand extended. "It's awesome to meet you. I'm Shane Easton, editor for ModInk Magazine. Ever heard of us?"
ModInk was one of the leading publications showcasing body modification. If you were in the business, or at all interested in tattoos, piercings, or other realms of the body mod world, you knew of ModInk. Shaking Shane's hand, my heart hammered a mile a minute, beating much faster than was healthy. Still, I managed to keep my composure, as I smiled cordially and nodded.
"Of course. Been a fan for years," I replied coolly, while hoping my palm wasn't too clammy. "What brings you to Salem?"
"You mean other than the history and awesome shit to do?" He released my hand and took a step back. "I came to check you out in person, my man."
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