by London Casey
I washed it down with orange juice. Then I switched to water.
I gave myself a few minutes and finally emerged from the bed. I stood up and was surprised to find the room not spinning. And my stomach didn’t bother me at all, either.
I gave two thumbs up to the mess in the reflection of the mirror.
And that’s exactly what I had become. A mess.
I stumbled from the bedroom and went across the hall to the bathroom.
The second I heard voices, everything in my body stopped. My head snapped to the right.
“She’s terrified. I get that. Maybe I’m terrified too.”
That voice.
I shook my head.
There was no way.
I went into the bathroom to splash some water on my face and wake up a little bit more. Then I decided that coffee was going to be only savior for this morning.
As I maneuvered from the hallway through the living room, Karen said, “Well, there she is…good morning, sunshine.”
I looked up to grin and reply, but I froze again.
River slowly stood up from the table in her kitchen.
I gasped.
“Morning, darlin’,” River said.
“What are you…” I looked at Karen. “What did you do?”
Karen poured me a cup of coffee. She then put the empty pot into the sink.
“I’m going to grab more coffee,” Karen said. “Somewhere else. I’ll be back later.”
Karen conveniently had her purse and keys ready to go.
She left the apartment, and I was alone with River.
River walked to the counter and grabbed the coffee mug. “One cream, three sugars.”
He looked at me and grinned.
“Two,” I whispered.
“You used to take three.”
“I changed my diet a little,” I said with a smirk.
River walked the coffee to me, and I took the mug. I needed it. Either that or a stiff drink. But the thought of a drink made my stomach growl in protest.
River leaned against the counter. “I think we fucked this all up, Lacey.”
“Oh?”
“Ten years ago, we were so damn young. And maybe in our hearts, it seemed so simple to just meet up and pick up where we left off. It didn’t work that way, did it?”
“You had an engagement ring with you,” I said. “I didn’t think you would really be there, River. But you were there. You were amazing. You were sexy. You kissed me so good. Better than anyone ever has kissed me. And you brought an engagement ring.”
River looked away and sighed. “I can’t deny any of that. Especially the sexy and good kissing part.”
He winked at me.
I smiled.
Fuck, he had a way of cutting into me.
“Lacey, I brought that ring…somewhere in my heart, yeah, I pictured dropping to one knee the day you came back to me. And only because I wanted you to know how much you mean to me. That nothing or nobody could replace that. Ever. And time couldn’t take that away either. Fuck, ten years? Twenty years. Fifty years. Whatever. I could be ninety and blind, but if I felt your hand touch my face…”
My throat felt like it was going to close.
A few seconds of speech from River was more romance than I’d experienced in the whole ten years we were apart.
“I didn’t give you that ring for no reason,” he said. “I didn’t want to scare you, Lacey. I had been going up there for so long… I…”
“Wait, what?” I asked.
“Shit,” River said. He turned and moved from the counter. “Nothing, Lacey. Look. I just wanted to see you for a second. Karen worked hard to track me down last night. She said you wanted to see me. I just wanted to prove to you that I’m right here. I’d love to know about the past ten years.”
Oh, hell no.
I put the coffee mug down. “River. Look at me right now.”
He turned again to face me. He was too close to the door for comfort.
“How many years have you gone up there?”
“I told you, I know the guy who owns all that land,” he said.
“No. That’s not an answer. I want to know how many times you went up there and waited for me.”
River ran a hand through his hair. He was older. Bigger. Stronger. But he was still the badass twenty-year-old I first met. The man who swept me off my feet and stole all my innocence.
He looked right at me. “Years, Lacey. Years. Okay?”
“Years,” I whispered. “Why?”
“I was drunk that night,” River said. “You know that. We talked about that. I couldn’t really remember. I remembered saying five years. Ten years. So I didn’t know. But I went there as much as I could, just in case. I thought that if something ever happened to you in your life and you were at your lowest, you’d be there. You’d go there for comfort and for hope. I wanted to be that for you, Lacey. Your comfort and your hope. I wanted to stand there as you arrived, and I wanted you to realize who I was. Who I am. No matter what the years did to us.”
River then walked to the door and started to open it.
Was I really going to let him leave?
“No,” I said. “No, no, no.”
River stopped. “No?”
I moved through the kitchen at lightning speed. Next thing I knew, I was grabbing River by his shirt. I swung my left foot and kicked the door shut. There I was, so much smaller than River, but I had him pinned against the wall.
“No,” I said.
“No what?” he asked.
“It’s not fair.”
“What’s not fair, Lacey?”
“That we lost each other. For no good reason. I never became a doctor. I lost my way completely. I hid for years, fearing you were gone and doing something else.”
River then touched my face. His hand stroked my cheek.
“Oh, darlin’, I know. Maybe we should have never let it happen. But it did. We have right now. Our future. If you want a future.”
“For the record, the ring was perfect,” I said. “And I’m sorry it freaked me out. I shouldn’t have seen the ring and I shouldn’t have left. I didn’t want it to become a one-day thing and then it’s gone.”
“It can become anything you want,” River whispered. “Everything is for you, Lacey. It’s why I’m standing here right now.”
Oh, fuck. He was killing me.
“So what do we do, River?” I asked.
“I have to get to work. But when I’m done, I want you, Lacey. At the cabin. Right where we belong. I want to shed the last ten years. Can we at least do that?”
I nodded. “River, I’ve been through a lot. I don’t want to mislead you into anything.”
“You never would,” he said. “I came because Karen said you were asking for me. If you need to be alone or need to be away, I’ll respect that.”
“I want to be with you, River,” I said. “But I don’t know…”
River came down and kissed me. His lips brushed mine. I felt gross. Messy hair, morning breath, my skin probably stinking of the booze from last night.
“Stop by the shop a little later,” he said. “Then we’ll take off from there.”
I nodded and backed up. I bit my lip and River stroked my cheek one last time before leaving the apartment.
I was a complete mess as I stood in the kitchen. For an entire decade, it was like I’d worn some kind of cloak over me, hiding everything it possibly could. I was just inches from slipping into a false reality that would have swallowed me up and wasted my life.
But now I had a chance to find my own destiny.
A destiny that started a long time ago.
With a bad boy who was now all man.
And even if he’d broken my heart, at least I could say it was broken by the right guy.
I looked down at my left hand, at my ring finger.
I should have stayed. I should have waited. I should have said yes.
River
PRESENT DAY
<
br /> The shop was busy. Some online publication had picked up on St. Skin, and we were named the venue of the week or some kind of shit like that. That meant there was a guy with a camera and a guy with a notebook asking questions, and that in turn meant I was expected to give an interview and share my thoughts on tattooing and what it meant.
I had no interest in that shit, though. At all.
Prick popped out of nowhere as the guy with notebook looked at me.
“Hey, bro, come here,” Prick said.
We slipped into the back.
“How’d it go?” he asked.
“What?”
“Ana. With the tits.”
“Jesus, man.”
“Come on, I sent her your way. That was my gift to you.”
“I don’t need ‘gifts,’ Prick.”
“Where is she?”
“Last time I saw her, she was in my bed,” I said.
“Fuck yeah! Damn, good. You knocked that shit out of your system.”
“Not quite,” I said. “But thanks for trying.” I patted Prick on the shoulder and walked away. I paused after a few steps and looked back. “Don’t ever do that again though. I can take care of myself.”
Out front, Tate called me over.
“I’m not doing a goddamn interview,” I said. “I have an appointment.”
I looked and saw that Cass was basically in a corner, getting drilled by the interviewer about his previous life as a rock star. And how he turned from that life to being a tattoo artist and a father.
Better him than me.
Then again, if the interviewer knew about my past, he’d be right up in my face. Nothing against Cass, but the rock star life had nothing on mine. Try serving some time behind bars and keeping your fucking sanity.
Tate put an arm around me and pulled me close. “And this guy here is another one of our best.”
A camera flashed.
“Fuck,” I whispered.
“Make a fist and touch it with mine,” Tate said.
My left fist across my body and his right fist across his body.
“This is weird,” I said.
“This is making us fucking rich,” Tate whispered. “So shut up and fucking smile.”
I posed for another picture and was forced into answering a few generic questions about tattooing.
Then I was saved by my appointment.
It was a guy named Jed who wanted to finish up his half sleeve. It ran from his elbow down to his wrist on his right arm. It started out with some tribal stuff he’d gotten done during a drunken stupor in Florida. Whoever did the original ink didn’t know what they were doing. So Jed came to me to fix it up. I suggested he just go with a half-sleeve. I came up with a few designs, and he fell in love with the idea.
Some days, I was in my chair, inking people up, bringing stories and memories to life. Other days, I sat there and felt like a fucking salesman trying to pitch an idea for someone’s skin. To help them make the right decision and to keep them from making a really bad one when it came to ink.
As laid-back and hidden as I tried to be in the shop with all the social media buzz we had gotten, I took serious pride in my work. It was my stamp and my art, visible to the rest of the world.
“Jed,” I said as we shook hands. “Come on back. Save me from this circus.”
“What’s going on here?” he asked.
“Nothing important,” I said.
We went into my room, and I shut the door. I plugged in my music player and let some hard rock blast through the speakers to drown out the noise in the front of the shop.
Jed climbed up on the chair and had his earbuds out and was fighting with the wire.
“So, we’re going to finish this up,” I said.
“I’m excited.”
I put on some gloves and grabbed his arm, inspecting my work. You couldn’t even tell there’d was a shit tattoo there to begin with.
In the beginning, Jed was just going to go with all dark colors. But then he decided to add in some colorful accents and shading, which was fine by me. I figured if someone was going to get ink, make it stand out. Make it bright. Make it say “fuck you” to anyone who dared to judge them for having the ink.
“So, I’m to finish up around the wrist first,” I said. “Then we’ll take a break. After that, it’s all touch up work. I want to get this done, but if you need to stop, you just let me know.”
“We’re good, River,” Jed said. “I need this. I need to win something this week.”
I nodded. “Then let’s get it done.”
Jed put his earbuds in and gave me his arm.
It was amazing what the ink meant to people. When we were younger, it was all about being cool. To be a teenager with a tattoo was instant coolness. Instant bad boy kind of stuff. But as you got older, you realized they were all stories. They were memories not saved in our mind, but memories we wore on our skin.
Nothing else could be more special.
With all that said and thought, I took a deep breath and got myself ready.
I needed to be in the right mindset. Let the world slip away. Become a part of the tattoo that I was creating.
The buzz of needle always made my heart jump.
Lucky for me, I was good at what I did for a living.
Why?
Because there was no focusing.
All I could think about was Lacey.
I would be anything she needed me to be.
I just knew one thing for sure.
She was never going to get away from me again.
I sat down on my stool and let out a long breath. It had turned into a really long appointment. Not by anyone’s fault, those were just the requirements of amazing art.
Jed was happy.
The noise out front had died down.
Life was good again.
Throughout St. Skin came the buzzing of needles and the music everyone chose to listen to. It was a mismatched mess of noise, but there was nothing quite like it. It was the closest thing to home I could possibly feel at that moment.
I exited my room and went to the front to see if anything had been scheduled with me. I tried to keep an open flowing schedule the best I could. I liked my sense of freedom; if the moment struck me and I had to take off for a day or two. Tate didn’t care, because he knew that I did great work and respected everyone in St. Skin and how they worked.
What I didn’t expect to find was Lacey standing there, staring at the wall of tattoo designs. She was close to the wall, admiring all the different designs. Everything from wicked tribal stuff to hearts and skulls, all the way to a small gallery of animals.
I stepped up behind her and said, “I can put a tiger right on your shoulder.”
She gasped and jumped.
She spun, and her eyes locked to mine.
Nobody around us could possibly understand what that look of hers did to me. I still saw the innocent yet wild girl in those eyes. But her body had morphed into that of a beautiful woman. Curves showed up in places where they were meant to be. Curves that begged for my hands to trace along them, leaving their own invisible tattoo memories for me to savor for a lifetime.
“River,” she said.
“You want to get something done?” I asked. “I’ve got time.”
“No thanks.”
“Do you have any tattoos?”
“That’s a secret,” she said with a smile.
She could always try to flirt, but I knew how to do it better.
I leaned in and put my lips close to her ear.
“I’ll find out one way or another, darling,” I whispered.
I felt the heat between us sizzling. I was afraid the fire alarms were going to start going off.
When I turned and grabbed at Lacey’s hand, here came Prick and Axel.
Ah, shit.
“And who do we have here?” Prick asked.
“Guys, this is Lacey,” I said. “Lacey, this is Prick and Axel.”
“Your name i
s Prick?” she asked.
Prick winked at her. “Lacey, huh? Why is that name familiar?”
“That’s the one he’s been waiting for,” Axel said. “Built a damn cabin for her, too.”
“Really?” I asked.
Axel laughed. Then he looked at Lacey. “And you’re midnight wonder, huh?”
“Excuse me?” Lacey asked.
“Your friend, Karen. She tracked me down to track down River.”
“Oh, this is getting interesting,” Prick said. “Give me more.”
“There is no more,” I said. “Don’t you have work to do?”
“Don’t you have a bed to clean out?” Prick asked with a devilish grin.
I let go of Lacey’s hand and went after him.
Axel quickly blocked the way, hand to my chest. “Easy, River. You know he’s an asshole. If that’s your girl right there, you better do something about it. You’ve been hinting about her for a long time. Now she’s here, huh?”
“I’m leaving,” I said. “I don’t know when I’ll be back. My cell is on. My schedule is clear.”
“Have fun,” Axel said.
I went to Lacey again, still pissed off that Prick said what he said.
“Sorry.”
“Do you have a girlfriend?” Lacey asked.
“No, darlin’, I don’t. I promise you. I wouldn’t do that to you or anyone else.”
“Okay,” Lacey said, unconvinced.
“Hey, I swear to you,” I said. “I’m an open book, Lacey. I have nothing to hide from you. I’ve waited so long…I’m torn.”
“Torn?”
“Between taking it slow and loving you…or just throwing you to a bed and showing you what you’ve been missing for a decade.”
Lacey’s eyes went wide.
I planted a kiss on her cheek.
I opened the door to St. Skin.
We walked out and I looked back at the tattoo shop.
The place had been my home while I was lost.
But holding Lacey—I was found.
Lacey
PRESENT DAY
I sat next to River in his truck. He begged me not to take my car up the mountain again. I had my bags in the back, and he was in control of the road. Inside myself, I was a twisted mess. It was amazing how so many roads could turn, end, and circle around, yet you never felt like you were actually getting somewhere.
