by Ina Carter
“I wonder how you are going to explain to your next boyfriend you have your friend’s name inked on your chest? At least I used symbols, not words…” He smirked.
“Hm.” I lifted my head, and straightened up, sat back on my soles, and looked at him confused. “What symbols?”
“Oh, c’mon. You haven’t checked my ink?” He teased me.
“No, actually not in detail. I noticed the baseball and the band.” I pointed to his left bicep which was closest to me. I was curious though. People permanently mark things that matter to them, so I wanted to know about Kevin and why he had so many tattoos. His right arm had a full sleeve, and the left looked like he was just getting started. “Why the tattoos. Kev?” I asked.
“You know how I am – I have to externalize things. The pain I kept inside, but I needed the happiness to be on display, like a shield of sorts. To remind me there are things in my life that I should be grateful for. I started getting inked around eighteen, and it's still an ongoing process. I don’t know, Lauren, maybe the tats make me look tougher than I actually am….”
I was staring at his right arm, looking closely into the complicated pattern, and finally making out objects, woven into the abstract design. It was a bit surrealistic imagery with twisting lines and elongated flames streaming down his shoulder, but then I saw familiar things, and I started laughing.
“No one who takes a close look at your ink would assume you are a tough guy, Kevin. Did you seriously ink a bunny and a daisy on your skin? Good thing you hid them, so it’s not obvious.” I teased him. He was looking at me intently, his face unreadable.
“You want to see the whole thing?” he asked, and before I could blink, his shirt was off.
I couldn’t help but stare. Not just the definition of his muscle and his hard abs, but at the whole picture of Kevin. He was magnificent. I felt the knot in my throat tighten like a steel marble that got stuck in there, and I had to swallow hard in a futile attempt to dislodge it. He drew my attention to his left arm and explained.
“The baseball and the bat are obvious.” He smiled, then his finger brushed over the armband in the base of his bicep muscle.
“It’s for your family, right?” I managed to whisper.
“Yeah, the circle of love.” He looked at me, and his eyes fired up. “This is my future, Lauren. There is so much more to be written… But this…” he points to his heart, and then brushed his hand over his right arm “This is what happiness meant to me back then.”
Now I saw it, a sun was peaking behind clouds on his chest, right where his heart beat hard underneath. It was making the fiery circle move like it was alive. The rays were like liquid gold, spreading down his shoulder, and entwined with the images hidden in the complex matrix.
“Do you see, this is our tree in the meadow, the daisy wreaths I weaved for you in spring, the velveteen rabbit, that I made Real a long time ago.” He whispered. I didn’t know what possessed me, but I reached for him, and my shaking fingers traced over the images, since they were as precious to me as they were to him. We shared happiness that was soul-deep, that overcame the pain we endured. In the simplicity of the small things that defined our childhood, there was so much love that I was swollen by it, forgetting everything else that existed in this world. My hand moved up Kevin’s arm over his shoulder and rested on his heart. It was like thunder under my fingers, singing a tune I felt in my bones.
“Under the clouds, there was always the memory of my sunshine,” he whispered.
The feeling that hit me was so powerful that I felt like my heart split open, and every single emotion I’d ever experienced, including some that my soul knew but kept secret from me, all poured out at the same time. I pulled my hand away from Kevin, afraid he would learn all my secrets through my touch, and find out how much it hurt me that his sunshine was in the past. I should have been happy that I meant so much to him, that he marked me on his body permanently. That he never forgot the time or the memories we shared. But I was selfish and greedy and wanted to be part of his present, not the old memory of the little girl he once loved. I was totally jealous of Julie.
I sat back, leaned on the back of the sofa, and pulled my knees to my chest. Tonight, I was running hot and cold on Kevin, probably confusing the hell out of him. He probably thought I got upset over his admission that the image on his chest was a symbol of me. His eyes were pained when I looked at him.
“Thank you, Kev. You also never forgot me, did you?” I tried to be rational and say the right thing.
“No, Lauren, I never forgot you.” He looked at me intently, his eyes probing, asking me millions of questions, but his jaw was tightly shut like he was biting the words he wanted to say.
“So, fair is fair. I showed you mine, are you going to show me yours?” He surprised me with his question.
“Your little bird?” He nodded down to my stomach and what was hidden behind my folded knees.
“How do you know I have another tattoo?” I asked perplexed. It was in a spot hidden from view - on the base of my stomach, right in the line of my panties. He smirked, like he got caught and had been looking there.
“You wear a lot of loose sweat pants, and I hide your chocolate on the top shelf,” he teased me. He was totally doing that on purpose, and obviously, I showed more skin than I should.
“C’mon, Lauren, I’ve already seen it; I just want to know the meaning behind it,” he begged.
He got off the couch and sat on his knees on the floor, making room for me to lie down. When I did, he reached for me and gently moved a strand of my hair away from my face and tucked it behind my ear, like he wanted an unobstructed view of my face. I lowered the elastic of my pajamas, not indecently low, just enough for him to see the little bird below my navel. To my surprise, he reached and brushed over it, softly, just barely touching the skin, like he was afraid it might scare me.
“I know she gave birth to me, but she never loved me, Kevin,” I admitted why I tattooed a little bird in that specific place. It was a small gray sparrow, but its wings were spread wide like it was about to take flight. “Dana kept me in a golden cage…”
“And one day, when you have a child, your belly would stretch, and your little bird would spread its wings. Then you would set it free…” he whispered. I looked at him, shocked he actually got the symbolism and what I meant by the image on my skin. Our eyes locked. Kevin’s palm rested on my belly, right over the bird, like he was protecting it, but he was still looking at me.
“Why gray? You should have put some color in that little birdie. If it’s going to be your kid, it’s going to be beautiful, Lauren,” he said softly. I closed my eyes and spilled my heart in Kevin’s palm.
“That’s the thing, Kev. You should love your kids, no matter what. You should love them not because they are pretty, but regardless of how they look… Once when I was six, you were sick and didn’t come to school. That bully Tommy started picking on me and called me ugly. I ran to the library and sat in our corner, crying. Miss Jessie came to me, and I told her why I was upset. She smiled and told me I was a pretty girl and should listen to my Mamma, not some bully. I asked her what she meant, because Connie never commented on my looks. In retrospect, I think Connie was afraid Mike might notice I didn’t look like either of them, so she only whispered in my ear endearments once in a while. I told Miss Jessie ‘Mamma never tells me I am pretty,’ and she smiled, in that sad way people do when they pity you. Then she picked a book and read me a story.”
“It was about birds and how they used to go to school, too. One day a beautiful nightingale saw her neighbor - the crow, rushing to school to bring lunch to her little birdie. The nightingale asked if she can take one worm to her baby as well. The crow asked how to recognize the little nightingale, and the mother said - it was easy, her baby is the most beautiful birdie in the whole school. Later the crow came back and said she gave the worm to her own little bird because she looked and looked, and there was no prettier child than her own…
“Miss Jessie was trying to tell me that all moms are biased and think their kids are beautiful, Kev. I don’t know about Connie, but Dana would have given that lunch to the flashiest bird in the nest, not to me. I would never make my children, if I have them one day, feel like they are not enough…”
I got still like I was afraid I had revealed to Kevin a deeply rooted insecurity, but he didn’t say anything. My eyes were still closed like I didn’t want to see his reaction to my story. I felt his hot breath on my skin, and then his lips right over my birdie. The intimate touch ignited a raging inferno right in my center, and my hips shot up like I wanted to merge with him, make his lips leave a mark more permanent than the ink underneath them. My eyes shot open when he pulled away and left me empty, wanting, and without breath.
Kevin got up on his feet and mumbled something like, “We better get to bed… I have to wake up in four hours…” and he was almost running out of the room. Not before I noticed the evidence of his arousal or the fact that he tried to hide it. Shoot! We totally crossed all lines of friendship, and it wasn’t just me sprinting over them.
And he was right, naked cuddling was a bad idea with your male best friend.
Chapter 17
I wasn’t sure where Kevin and I stood and how I should act the next day, but many things happened simultaneously. I heard voices from the living room and recognized Liam’s laughter. I was still in the same clothes from last night and flushed from the hot dream I had about a certain green-eyed man. My phone beeped with a text from Marina. I looked at the screen and read my besties’ message. “In L.A., coffee?” Thank God for divine interventions because I needed my girlfriend’s advice about what to do about my… whatever Kevin was right now.
I rushed to the living room to greet Liam, worried that something might have happened in Florida for him to be back early. He was laughing and talking to his brother, who obviously hadn’t gone to practice this morning. Kevin looked disheveled, his hair messy, and dark circles were under his eyes like he hadn’t slept.
“Hey, you are back!” I smiled at Liam, afraid to look Kevin in the eyes.
“For a few days, anyway. My Dad decided to surprise Mom for her birthday with a trip to Hawaii, so I decided to take a break myself. Is everything okay in here?” He looked between Kevin and me like he was sensing the weird vibes in the air.
“Yeah, it’s all good!” We both said simultaneously, then finally looked at each other. Kevin grinned first, and my own smile made an appearance.
“We are good!” I said that at Kevin, letting him know that I was putting behind us what happened last night. Now that we were both guilty of lapses in judgment maybe we could get back to normal and act like friends. He sure looked worried that the line he had crossed might be a problem for me.
“Why aren’t you in the gym?” I asked Kevin as casually as I could sound.
“I overslept and didn’t hear Jared calling me this morning. I’ll go take a shower and maybe hit the gym and put in some extra hours. I don’t have classes today, so…” He murmured, ready to get going.
“No, bro, I told you I invited the gang, and they are dying to meet Lauren. You better stay here and help me to put something together for the hungry wolves,” Liam confronted him.
I’d heard about Liam and Kevin’s group of friends from high school, but I was busy with classes and study groups the few times he drove to Pasadena to hang out with them, so I was curious to meet them, too.
“Bummer. My friend Mari is in town, and I was planning to spend the day with her,” I said, disappointed.
“Just invite her over, Lauren. It would be fun, right, Kev?” Liam offered.
“Mari? The best friend you showed me a picture of?” Kevin perked up, but then looked at his brother and smirked like he was into a joke of his own “Yup, please invite her, Lauren. You and your friend can just hang out here? Liam and I would give you space so you can catch up.”
“Totally.” Liam gave me a thumbs up, agreeing with his brother. I had no idea what Kevin’s ulterior motive was, but I honestly needed alone time with Marina, and Starbucks was not the best place to talk about personal problems.
I called her when I got to my room to grab my toiletries and asked her if she was okay to spend the day with me at Liam’s house and stay for a party afterward.
“Sounds good. Should I bring potluck or something? My mom is trying to fatten me up and cooked food for a legion this morning. I’ll say I am taking some for the road,” she offered.
I knew Marina’s mom and her delicious food, so I was not even planning to eat breakfast until she brought something from home. I gave her the address and went to take a shower before she arrived.
Kevin was alone in the kitchen when I came out of the bathroom. Thank God I was all dressed this time because our moment on the couch last night was still fresh in my memory. He surprised me when he caught me in the hallway, and his arm wrapped around my waist. He was looking at me funny like he was assessing my reaction.
“Are we still friends or you want to slap me?” he asked, his lips quirking to the side. I didn’t know what to say, considering he was way too close and slapping him was not what went through my head. Neither was friendship.
“What are you talking about? Slap you for what?” I decided to play it dumb. His lips parted like now he was lost for words.
“Never mind then. I guess I am being stupid… I just don’t want to lose you again, Lauren.” He sounded genuine, and I understood because the feeling was mutual.
I pulled him closer to me and gave him a big hug. “You won’t, Kevin. I am here,” I reassured him. I was not going to screw this up, and it seemed Kevin and I were on the same page.
When we pulled apart, Liam was standing a few feet from us, watching us with wide eyes. He cleared his throat and looked between Kevin and me a bit lost for words.
“You two seem to be getting along…” He smirked. “When I left a month ago, I was afraid I’d have to clean blood stains from the carpet.”
“Your house doesn’t have carpet, bro. Hardwood is easy to wipe,” Kevin joked, and I laughed.
“Yeah, he is a bleeder. I just stayed away from his pretty face because Calvin Klein might mind if he had a broken nose,” I added, the joke totally directed at Liam. Kevin and I exchanged looks, both chuckling. It was somehow getting back to normal, and humor was the best way to go about it.
The doorbell rang and, excited, I jumped, running to the door to meet Marina. I almost smothered her with my enthusiastic hug, but I did miss her so much. I pulled away and looked at my bestie. She was gorgeous, as usual. Dressed in simple black skinny jeans and a blue tank top, Marina still looked like she stepped off a catwalk a moment ago. I knew some scouts had chased her once in the mall, but she had some internal repulsion to anything that had to do with the fashion world, so I didn’t even try to tell her she looked like a model. I think it had to do with her sister who died years ago before they immigrated to the US, but my friend had never told me the whole story. I’d seen pictures in their house, and her older sister was one of the most beautiful girls I’d ever seen. Marina was a close second, but she usually tried to downplay her looks, keeping her hair in a tight ponytail and wearing simple clothes, like she hated the attention she usually got.
“Don’t make me drop the plate, or my mother would kill both of us. It’s some family china that she is saving for my wedding or something...” Marina joked, trying to hug me back, while she was juggling a dish of something that smelled delicious.
She walked in and looked around Liam’s house, her smile fading. “Wow, you didn’t mention you live with some rich guy,” she whispered. I knew she had a distaste for that type even more than me, but I didn’t want her to have some preconceptions about my new friends.
“Liam is great, Mari, you shouldn’t judge him before you meet him.” I scorned her.
“Okay, fine, I’ll keep an open mind.” She rolled her eyes, making me laugh.
I took
the plate from her hands and walked with her to the living room. Kevin looked at Marina and smiled. Liam, on the other hand, just stared, like he had lost his marbles.
“Hey, this is my friend, Marina,” I tried to introduce her, but Mari was already ahead of me, taking the plate as she went and placing it on the counter, looking probingly between Kevin and Liam.
“So, which one is Lauren’s brother? Let me guess.” She squinted her eyes like she was studying the two guys. She pointed to Kevin and blurted at him, “I hope it’s not you because you are totally Lauren’s type, and she might go totally Jamie Lannister on your ass.”
Kevin was taking a sip from his coffee and choked, spitting the liquid into the sink next to him. He looked at me, and his mouth fell open.
“You know she is not my sister, right?” he stated and made Marina laugh.
“Oh, I know. You don’t need to justify why it’s okay to have sex with her.” She pinned him.
Marina was not making things better, especially today that Kevin and I were treading a thin line, trying to fix our friendship and ignore the attraction between us.
“She is pushing your buttons, Kev. Don’t fall for it! Mari is super competitive, and you are threatening her place as a best friend. She is trying to eliminate the competition. I also sent her a picture of you a few weeks ago.”
I was trying to diffuse the situation because Kevin was totally flustered, looking at me like someone hit him with a hammer over the head.
At the same moment, Liam decided it was time to join the conversation, stepped in front of my friend, and extended his hand to Marina, saying something to her in Russian. My eyes were about to pop, and it was my turn to be shocked. Kevin was hiding his snickers and came to my side. Marina smiled wildly and also responded in Russian. They were saying things I didn’t get, but by their expressions, both seemed pleasantly surprised that they had something in common.
