Beatless

by Amber L. Johnson

  We were slated to perform one more time as a band – if you could qualify us as that. The response was ridiculous and at The Kick we were treated like stars. It felt a little surreal. I felt out of my element under that much attention. But it was a lot easier to take being part of a group.

  Britt Sanders, one of the upper echelons of his high school hierarchy stopped Tucker in the parking lot to give him an almost violent high five.

  “You’re the shit!”

  Tucker rubbed his hand and winced. “Better than just being called shit, right?”

  Holding his upper his arm, I just stared at this exchange. I’d found myself in the shelter of his embrace a lot during these past few weeks - tucked into his side while we ate lunch or hung out at our friends’ houses.

  Or in the Resources section of the library, because really, no one was ever back there. Still, there was the rush of possibly being caught that made the whole thing worth it.

  “You’re driving me crazy,” he breathed into my ear, dipping his face low to press open mouth kisses to my neck and across my collarbone.

  Our physical relationship was growing as time went on. I was surprised at how easy the transition had been from never doing anything, to suddenly wanting everything. And the thought of Tucker being my first didn’t cause me to be anxious at all. If I was going to do it, then he’d be my number one choice. I never told him these things, though. I couldn’t find the right words or the right timing.

  His hands traveled every place he could get to, over my shirt, inside the pockets of my jeans, or the backs of my thighs if I was wearing a skirt. I was always nervous about where my hands should go but they inevitably ended up fingertip deep around his waistband. Unless he got bold and placed my hand on his zipper to prove his point.

  “Soon,” I promised, wishing that I’d be a little braver and just take the plunge already.

  ***

  “You should invest in some Chap Stick,” Sam chuckled over dinner one night. “And by the way, he needs to leave before midnight. I’m cool with him coming over but I still have to take your mom’s rules into consideration. Plus, you need sleep. And whatever other old people excuses I can make for trying to keep you from getting pregnant before you graduate.”

  “Oh my God,” I whispered and covered my face. “We’re not . . .”

  She waved her hand. “Yeah, I know.”

  My loss of appetite caused me to rise from the table and scrape the rest of the food on my plate into the trash can. “Speaking of Mom, she hasn’t called in a few days.”

  Sam averted her gaze and picked up her glass to refill it with tea. “I . . . yeah. About that.”

  I waited, leaning against the sink. If my aunt was having trouble explaining it then it was probably a huge deal.

  She took in a huge breath and cleared her throat as she formed her thoughts. “Your mom did call me. She’s really busy and you’ve been busy so . . . Anyway. She told me that she met someone. In Texas. You know . . . where she is. In Texas. For work.”

  I knew where my mother was. The falter in Sam’s voice caused my jaw to clench. “Cool.” It was the only response I really had to the news. My mom had left me with my aunt and now she was starting up a new relationship in a completely different state and I was supposed to be okay with it.

  “Listen, kiddo. It was bound to happen.”

  “She could have let it happen a little closer to home.” I turned and grabbed hold of the sponge, wetting it and furiously scrubbing at my plate, getting immense satisfaction from the amount of bubbles I was producing.

  The sound of Sam rising and slowly approaching from behind made my shoulders slump and when she turned me to pull me into a hug, I allowed myself to crumble against her chest.

  “I think some part of me thought they’d get back together,” I choked against her.

  “Well, we all have hopes.”

  “She’s going to stay there?”

  “No, of course not. She has to come back.”

  “She’ll just make you stay with me until I get my Associates.”

  “No, she won’t. She can’t.”

  “I don’t want things to change like this, though.” My mind raced with all the scenarios this new revelation brought up. Would she sell the house? I’d lived here my entire life. I had often thought about how I’d come home over breaks and still have my room. That the house would someday be mine to raise my own family in.

  “Eventually everything changes,” Sam said softly, running her hand through my hair. “Complacency is for the weak.”

  ***

  There was a lot on my mind the day before our final show. I was distracted – couldn’t remember my parts or my cues. Sara eventually pulled me aside to ask if I was okay and I had to pretend that I was. There were very few people I could share everything with, that I felt comfortable opening up and confessing my deepest fears to. I’d already been labeled as overdramatic - I didn’t need to have someone else giving me that stigma.

  On the drive home, Tucker reached over and slipped his fingers between mine, placing our intertwined digits in his lap. I leaned back in the passenger seat and closed my eyes to try and quiet my racing thoughts.

  “You all right?” he asked over the sounds of the radio.

  “Not really.”

  “Okay.”

  It was like that with us. He didn’t press. He didn’t demand. He was always waiting for me to be ready.

  Without opening my eyes, I knew he was staring at me. I couldn’t fight the smile it elicited. “Stop staring at me,” I muttered.

  He took a left and squeezed my hand. “Couldn’t if I tried.”

  I didn’t want him to drop me off. I wanted to keep going. To drive off into the night and never look back or care about anything ever again. I wanted to run away and take him with me, but reality tugged at the edges of my fantasies, causing me to shift uncomfortably in my seat. Tucker would probably never want to leave this place. He couldn’t be that far from his sister. From his dad. From the life he’d always known – no matter how much it sucked.

  I wondered if I got my grant and went away to Vanderbilt, how he’d react. If he’d wait. If he’d visit. I tried to imagine the two of us in my mom’s childhood home, and a mental picture of him sitting at the wall piano playing while I cooked dinner in my mom’s old pots and pans made my breath hitch. I’d never thought about any of that before. And I was momentarily scared.

  “Should I come in?” He was always asking for permission. He never just parked and followed.

  My hand was warm in his and more than anything I wanted a distraction from the thoughts in my mind. But I was also fighting the feeling that eventually everything was going to change. And I wasn’t ready for that tonight.

  “Tomorrow. I have that paper due . . .”

  He brushed his lips against my knuckles and nodded. “Tomorrow sounds good.”

  Our goodnight kiss was short and sweet. My heart was there but my head was swimming with too many "what ifs" that I couldn’t give him more than that for the night.

  And when I dreamed, it was of Tucker telling me goodbye.

  ***

  “Last one,” Berkley said in the back room of The Kick. “I’m going to miss the hell out of this.”

  Marcus stood and grabbed her by the shoulders to hug her fiercely.

  “Whoa there,” she mumbled into his chest.

  “This has been the best year of my life,” he said, squeezing her tighter and making her squeak, her arms flailing a little at his sides.

  When he released her, she shuffled back and straightened her hair. “Let’s not get all sentimental now. Save it for later.” Marcus actually blushed.

  Sara held her face in her hands and looked at all of us standing in a semi-circle. “There won’t be a later. No after show to discuss next week’s gig. No reason to go over anything.”

  “I didn’t think about that,” Berkley said sadly. “We could. For old time’s sake?”

  “Maybe we s
hould just go out with a bang,” Sara countered, picking at nothing on her leggings. “I’d like to remember it this way. Plus, I have less of a chance to cry onstage. And my makeup is amazing tonight. I’m just saying.”

  Tucker paced the room, rubbing his ear until the tip was an unhealthy red. I followed behind until he noticed and stopped to face me. Reaching up, I tugged his hand down and held it in my own.

  “It’s the last one. We don’t have anything left to prove.”

  “You’re right.” He leaned in and rested his forehead against mine.

  “We’re great.”

  “We’re better than great.”

  For a split second, I could believe he wasn’t talking about the band.

  ***

  As the last note of the final Beatless performance hung over the crowd, I closed my eyes and clutched the microphone to my chest. It would only be a matter of minutes before all of it was over and I wanted to extend that feeling as long as I could.

  We exited the stage and slowly made our way back to the room that I’d come to adore so much over such a small space of time. There were hugs exchanged and promises made that we’d still hang out – we’d have dinner one more time for old time’s sake - and Berkley would write from college. And maybe we could take a road trip to see her. So I said all of the right words, nodded at all the right times, smiled my way through it. But I’d been through this before and I had a suspicion that it would end up exactly the same as the last time. More of my heart being given away with no hope of return.

  I’d come to love the people I was saying goodbye to. It felt final, even if it shouldn’t have. I could sense my walls going up and I fought the urge to shut down.

  Tucker led me to his car, holding my hand across the packed parking lot, stopping to speak to small groups of people. I stayed quiet and held onto his arm, waiting until he decided it was time to leave.

  I’d never wanted to get away from myself more in my entire life.

  When we finally made it to the car, I could feel the rise of anxiety starting beneath my sternum. Tucker leaned over and grabbed my wrist.

  “What’s going on with you?”

  “I’m freaking out.”

  “About what?” He was so close and I wanted to crawl into his lap and ask him if he was going to go, too – if every single person in my life was inevitably slated to leave me behind. Instead, I pulled him by his shirt until we were kissing – desperate to have contact with him because I was feeling so lost.

  “Hey.” He sat back and disentangled my fists from his almost demolished t-shirt. “Seriously. Talk to me, Mal.”

  I looked out the window into the night and closed my eyes tightly. “Can we go somewhere? Anywhere but home. I don’t want to be there right now.”

  “Of course.” He started the car, taking a right instead of a left, and aiming the car toward an unknown destination. I took my own liberties in his vehicle; he’d given me free rein after all. I turned on the radio then rested my head against the cold window.

  After a while, he pulled off the road onto some gravel, his headlights bouncing across dirt as it rose before the hood. Trees surrounded us and I waited, holding my breath until we’d cleared them and he parked the car by an old dilapidated fence. I couldn’t see any houses for miles, but the sky above was wide open – a black canopy of twinkling stars and what I imagined Forever to look like.

  “Talk.” He faced me head on and I pushed my hands between my thighs, thinking.

  “My mom met someone in Texas. If it’s serious, then everything changes. And the group is done. Berk’s leaving. We’re almost halfway through the year and that means in just a few months everything is going to be different . . .”

  There was a frown on his face as he listened. “Don’t cry.”

  I didn’t even realize I was until he said it. Wiping my face furiously, I tried to twist away but he slid a finger beneath my chin and turned it back toward him.

  “I thought I wanted one thing and now I want another and I’m just so tired of being so unsure of everything.”

  “Are you unsure of this?” He pointed between us, his face lit by the dashboard, increasing the shadows under his eyes.

  “It’s probably the one thing I’m not.” I laughed sadly and tried to wipe around my eyes for the residual mascara I could feel collecting there. Fidgeting in my seat, I sat on my hands and sniffled, hating that I sounded so worked up.

  “Distract me.”

  “Distract you with what?”

  “With whatever. You're good at it. Let’s . . . I don’t know . . . teach me something. Something we haven’t talked about before.”

  Tucker’s fingers drummed along the steering wheel, and then he reached over and started to search through the radio stations until he found what he wanted. He turned the volume up to an almost illegal decibel. “Lean your seat back,” he called over the noise, and I did. He mimicked my position and angled his body, knees pointed at mine. “Close your eyes and listen. Describe the bass for me.”

  My lids drifted closed and I honed in on the sound as it filled the car. How the bass line thumped through the seat and reverberated through my bones. The shaking beneath my ass and at my sides. The pulsing beat cleared my head and I melted into the old cracked seat, my hands resting above my shoulders and fingers curled around the headrest.

  “It’s low. Deep. Right there.” Moving my hand to my chest, I kept going. “It rumbles through here.” My fingers slipped lower over my belly and farther until I was gripping my knee, pulling at the soft knit of the grey thigh high leg warmers I’d borrowed. My skirt rode up above them, the black cotton shifting higher as I squirmed. The sound was doing something to me and the only thing I could equate it to was the deep throbbing I had when Tucker and I spent time in my bed.

  My whole body flinched when his hand reached over and scooted mine away from my legs. Much stronger than he’d ever touched me before; he gripped my left thigh and slid it toward him. His palm crept higher and I kept my eyes closed, losing myself to the feeling. When his fingertips brushed soft cotton, I turned my hazy gaze to him.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Distracting you,” he said, using his other hand to turn down the volume a bit. The reverb was still pulsing through my body, but with less force. My hips slipped lower to chase the sound, ultimately giving him more access than he’d ever had before. With just one finger, he traced the elastic digging into my inner thigh, and then inward across the familiar heat and ache I’d been carrying around for weeks.

  My knees spread wider, easy under his touch. He got bold and added his other fingers, massaging me through my underwear until I was sure I would hyperventilate in his car. The air was thick and warm, the windows fogging up with each shallow exhale from my mouth. The skirt was riding higher until I could feel it bunched up around my midsection, and with a start, I realized my panty-covered ass was flush with the passenger seat, Tucker’s hand between my thighs.

  Taking hold of his wrist, I turned my attention toward him and noted the look of surprise on his face when I made a bold move and slipped his fingers into the elastic waistband, and lower until they were flush with my skin.

  The sound that came out of his mouth made my chest shudder.

  He circled and skimmed his pointer finger slowly before tilting forward across the console to kiss my open mouth, tugging at my lower lip at the same time that he dipped his finger inside.

  Raising my right knee higher, it wobbled against the door and I gripped the back of his neck, lifting my hips to get more contact. I kissed his mouth, his cheek, down his jaw and buried my face in his neck. It felt so good to be wanted. To be right there with him.

  The intense feelings that were building up inside me threatened to burst through my chest as his knuckles rose and fell, keeping up the pace. Eventually I placed my hand atop his to slow it down to a gentle rhythm. His focus was on what he was doing and when he finally looked up at my face I could see everything in his eyes.


  Without a word, he removed his hand and used both to grip the sides of my underwear. I lifted my pelvis to let him roll them down my thighs, over the grey wool, past my shoes, and onto the floor. He kissed my throat when he repeated the process with my shirt. And then my bra. The only piece of clothing left was the bunched up skirt and I didn’t mind the small amount of decency it afforded me in a very indecent situation.

  He didn’t need to tell me with words what to do. Lifting me by my arms, he helped me into the back of the car and then folded the front seats forward to give us more room. Lying on my back I waited for him to settle above me so that I could help him out of his shirt. His chest against mine was rapidly becoming my favorite thing in the whole world. The heaviness and warmth of his body against mine. The way he held his full weight off, locking his elbows by my head to run his fingers through my hair, or one handed to glide his palm across my chest and stomach.

  His hips rested between my thighs and I wrapped my calves around his legs, urging him closer. Tucker groaned and his stomach flexed against mine when his pelvis angled upwards. His lips traveled across my throat and lower, mouth finally connecting with my chest, kissing and using his tongue while I tried to find a place to put my hands. Gripping his sides, my back arched up and I let out a foreign, breathy sound.

  With an expert maneuver, he had us sitting up and I straddled his lap, letting his hands traverse my spine and lower, cupping my cheeks while he continued the sweet torture with his mouth, my head falling back. When his palm moved between us to resume what we’d started, I dug my fingers into his shoulders and sank down onto his hand.

  His other digits traced my side and back; palm open he pressed the heel of his hand into the base of my spine and led my hips into a tempo that matched the music around us. Sweat started to form between my breasts and I couldn’t find air as my head went dizzy. I was fumbling between us for his belt. For something to hold onto. And in a momentary rush of bravado, I shoved my hand down his jeans.

  “Hold on,” he gasped in a pained voice. “Hold on.”

  My thundering heart stopped and then sank. “Why?”

  He cradled my cheek in one hand and ran his thumb across my swollen bottom lip. “I don’t have anything.”