Atone

by Beth Yarnall

  She strokes my hair. “It’s been a long time for me too. Pretty much never.”

  I don’t know what she means by that.

  She pulls away and grips my face so I have to look at her. “You can’t do that avoidance shit with me. Got it? You don’t have a single fucking clue how this was for me. Don’t take it away from me with your guilt and regret. Let me have this. Okay?”

  I don’t know what she means by that either. I can’t read the expression on her face. It’s kind of like the look she got that night at the diner, only not so hard and angry. Whatever she’s thinking about is not in this room. It’s somewhere else.

  “Yeah. Okay,” I agree.

  Her kiss has me reaching for her and bringing her down on top of me. God, the feel of her. She straddles my hips, her pussy pressing against my dick. I’m already getting hard again. Her breasts bounce as she leverages herself over me. I take one in each hand, running my thumbs over her nipples, marveling at how they stiffen and the little sound she makes in the back of her throat.

  “It’s just you and me here tonight. Promise me.”

  I nod. “Just you and me.”

  “We don’t have a past or a future. Only now.”

  “Only now.”

  I don’t question why she needs this reassurance, because I need it too. I need the absolution of living in the moment. When I walked into this room I took off my grief and left it outside along with the past. I was so lost without it until she grounded me with her honesty. Maybe that’s why I came here…to see how it would feel to let it go, if only for a short while. She’s a safe place to hide from the world and who I couldn’t be. I hope I’m the same for her.

  Pushing away any other thoughts except the way she looks and feels on top of me, I concentrate on giving her what she wants. To be fully present in the here and now. A mindless fuck. I focus on her pleasure and what makes her gasp and grind against me. Her face is flushed, her head thrown back. I repeat the motion, strumming her clit with one hand while hitting deep inside her with the fingers of my other hand. She clamps her hands on my wrists and cries out, her whole body taut. She’s so fucking beautiful I lose my breath watching her.

  My dick is hard and insistent beneath her, but I don’t make a move to relieve it. I’m too mesmerized by the new look in her eyes. I move my hands around to her hips and up to her waist. She lies down on top of me with a sigh, her head tucked beneath my chin. Smoothing my hands up her back, I close my eyes and focus on the feel of her. I could lie like this with her forever and never move.

  Pressing her hot, open mouth to my chest, she sucks, marking me. The sting shoots straight to my dick and I push on her hips to relieve the ache she’s creating. Her mouth begins a journey south as she inches down my body, licking and biting. I groan as her breasts rub against my dick. And then she’s on her knees between my legs, taking me in her mouth. My breath hitches. I lift my head to watch.

  Her eyes are on mine as her lips wrap around my shaft, pistoning along with her hand, up and down. I stroke the side of her face. She takes me deep, sucking hard. My vision blurs. She does something with her other hand that makes my hips jerk. Oh, fuck. I’m gonna come. My head drops back and I can’t move. She has me pinned down. Her mouth is fucking genius. My hips buck in time with her strokes. The tightening of my fingers on her scalp is the only warning she gets. I raise my head, my whole body tight. She deep-throats me and that’s it. My hips flex as I come in her mouth. There’s a roaring in my ears and I go temporarily blind.

  She holds on to me until I go lax, her gaze never leaving mine. Lifting her head, she pulls her mouth off me slowly, as though she’s reluctant to let go. Her lips purse at the tip and she gives my dick a kiss. The way she looks at me in that moment is unreal. I’m ripped wide open. Who is this girl and how did I get here with her?

  “Come here.” I tug on her wrist.

  She crawls back up my body, straddles my hips, her forearms bracketing my head, and looks down at me. I take her face in my hands and kiss her, openmouthed. It’s a lazy, sated kiss. We’re the wrong way on the bed. My legs dangle over the side and she’s heavy on top of me, but I’m more comfortable than I’ve been in a long damn time. Maybe it’s the booze or the sex or both. I don’t know. Maybe it’s just her. I can’t remember feeling this easy, like anything could happen and I’d roll with it instead of it rolling over me.

  She breaks the kiss and traces a finger around the edge of my lips as though she’s trying to memorize their shape. That’s a stupid thing to think, but that’s how it feels. Her eyes follow the movement around and around. It’s ticklish. I let her do it anyway. She could do just about anything to me right now and I’d let her. It’s not just the blowjob—although it was fucking amazing—it’s her. I’m not supposed to compare, and there’s no way to do it without cheating them both, but I can’t do things—do this—with Vera and not make comparisons to the only other woman I’ve ever slept with.

  Everything with Vera is new and interesting and exciting. Everything with Cassandra toward the end was frustrating and difficult and work. We were trying to start over when she was killed. I was trying to forget she slept with someone else during the time we were broken up. We were trying to find our way back to the new and the easy and the exciting. And then she was gone. I was left with nothing but if-onlys and thoughts of what might have been. It was what might have been that I held on to.

  I saw the grief for what might have been in my parents and how it fucked them up like it’s fucking me up. Maybe that’s why I came here—to not be like them. To try something I haven’t been able to do—let what might have been go and grab on to what might be. Vera is what might be. My new job at the agency is what might be. Trying to forge a new relationship with my parents is what might be.

  If I’m honest with myself things with Cassandra weren’t all that great. Admitting that feels disloyal, like spitting on her grave. I loved her. Hell, I still love her. I think I always will. I can’t talk about her without talking about how angry I was with her when she died. That’s why I don’t talk about her.

  I never got to say goodbye. There was no closure. I was sitting in a jail cell, wondering how I got there and how it could be possible she was dead when they buried her. I’ve never even visited her grave. I’m not exactly sure where it is. She’s been in the ground for more than six years. I can’t picture her there. In my head, she’s someplace else, like Europe or something. Any moment she could come back. I hold on to that, along with everything else that was Cassandra and me. The good, the bad, and the tragic.

  Vera taps my forehead, knocking me out of my morbid thoughts. “You promised just you and me.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.”

  She climbs off me, grabs the bottle and tips it back, taking too big a drink, then hands it to me. I finish it off in three big gulps. My head swims. It’s just the thing I need to push back the thoughts I shouldn’t have had. She grabs a slice of cold pizza and takes a bite, regarding me with a solemn expression. I’ve disappointed her. I didn’t leave everything outside. I hauled it in and piled it around me, walling myself off.

  “The only time you’re not feeling guilty is when you’re drinking or screwing. Either we need more alcohol or we need to have more sex.” She regards me over the top of the half-eaten slice of pizza. “I’m too sore to have sex again and I’m already feeling hungover.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “For which part?”

  “All of it. I’m sorry I fucked this up for you. I’m sorry you’re sore—I should’ve been gentler—and I’m sorry you’re not feeling good.”

  “Are you staying or leaving?”

  “I want to sleep with you, if you’ll let me.”

  “You gotta tell me what you were just thinking.”

  “Why do you want to talk about it?”

  She wipes her face and hands with a napkin, then balls it up and throws it at me. I let it bounce off my chest and onto the floor. She’s mad. Not just angry…piss
ed.

  “Because it will never go away if you don’t,” she says. “You haul it everywhere you go.”

  “What do you want me to say?”

  “What were you just thinking?”

  I shake my head. I can’t say it.

  “What?” she taunts. “Afraid you’ll scare me off?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it with you. It doesn’t feel right.”

  “I’m laying on top of you naked and you’re thinking about another woman. That’s not right.”

  “I wasn’t thinking about her that way. Fuck. Just leave it.” I lean over to grab my shirt, but she snatches it and my pants away from me. I’m slow from all the fucking booze. I’d have to rip them out of her hands to get them back.

  “You had a look on your face.” She points at me. “Like that one.”

  “What one? What the hell are you talking about? Give me my clothes.”

  I make a swipe for her, but she’s faster, scooting out of reach. I stalk toward her. She’s quick, running over the bed to the other side. We’re both naked and drunk. This is ridiculous.

  “Give me my damn clothes.”

  “What are you afraid of?”

  “Right now I’m afraid I’m going to have to walk home naked.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t all sunshine.”

  “Shut up.” I grab for her again, but she’s too quick.

  “Maybe she’s better in bed than me.”

  “Don’t do that.”

  “Why not? You were comparing us, weren’t you? And don’t fucking lie to me.”

  “Not the way you’re making it sound.”

  “Then in what way?”

  She dances away again. All this over and around is making me dizzy.

  “Just stop!”

  My outburst freezes her on top of the bed and she looks down at me like she won. I dive for her, knocking her legs out from under her, careful to aim her so she hits the bed and not the floor. Pulling her by the ankles, I drag her toward me and lean down over her, right in her face.

  “I’m fucking pissed off at her!”

  “I thought she was perrrrrfect.”

  “Perfect people don’t fuck your best friend!”

  “Oh, shit.”

  “Perfect people don’t abort your baby and then act like you made them do it.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Perfect people don’t torture you imagining what that baby would’ve looked like.”

  “Oh, my God.”

  “And perfect people don’t get raped and murdered by some sick fuck so you can’t be mad at them for all the fucked-up things they put you through before they died.”

  “Oh, Beau.”

  “Are you fucking happy now?”

  She puts her hands on my face. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I love her, but I fucking hate her. You’re not supposed to hate someone who died the way she did. It’s not fucking right.”

  “None of it is right. What she did to you or what happened to her. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

  She presses her lips to my face over and over. Her kisses are wet, and then I realize it’s me. I’m fucking crying like a fucking baby, which pisses me off even more. Goddamn it. I roll off her onto my back and scrub my hands over my face. She brings my arm around her and lays her head on my chest, holding me tight. She dries my face with my T-shirt. I’m tired. I’m so fucking tired.

  I’ve been holding it all in for six years. I couldn’t tell anyone any of this. Not my lawyers, not Cora, no one. It would’ve been more evidence to pile on the mountain they already had against me. It wouldn’t have helped me and it wouldn’t have brought her back. So I buried it, carrying it around inside me like a parasitic twin that fed off my good memories of Cassandra until I hardly had any left and I hated myself.

  Chapter 12

  Vera

  Beau stares at the ceiling, tears flowing from the corners of his eyes into his hair. I’m not sure he realizes he’s crying or if he even knows I’m here. He’s somewhere else in his head. Since the dam broke, he hasn’t stopped talking. All of the thoughts and feelings he’s kept boarded up for the past six years keep flowing like a bleeding wound that can’t be stanched.

  “I don’t really hate her,” he mumbles. “I shouldn’t have said any of that shit about her.”

  “I know you don’t,” I tell him, stroking his face. “It’s okay to be mad at her.”

  “All the shit she went through before she died. We had our problems, but I never would’ve wanted any of that to happen to her.” He presses the heels of his hands against his eyelids. “I can’t get the coroner photos out of my head. The diagrams of her wounds. The description of the rape and the…He fucking turned her over and raped her that way too. Hours. He spent hours on her. He stuffed her panties in her mouth and taped it shut to keep her quiet so he could fuck her over and over and no one would hear.

  “She fucking fucked my best friend, but she didn’t deserve that. She didn’t deserve it.” He rolls over on his side, curling his big body away from me. “She didn’t fucking deserve it.”

  “I know.” I hug him from behind. “It’s okay.”

  “I was going to break things off with her. I couldn’t deal with what she did. I tried. I just couldn’t.”

  He rolls back toward me. We’re on our sides, face-to-face. His eyes are dry and fevered. He blinks at me slowly, as though he’s just remembering I’m here.

  “I’m sorry.” He wraps his arms around me, bringing me in close. “I shouldn’t drink. I’m shit at this kind of stuff sober and, apparently, worse drunk. Tell me to shut up.”

  “Do you feel better?”

  “No.”

  “Lighter?”

  “No. Just tired.”

  “Then maybe we should go to sleep.”

  We get out of bed and then get back in the right way, pulling the covers over us. I’ve never slept in a bed with a man before. The only time I ever shared a bed was with another girl out of necessity, so I don’t know how this is supposed to work. Beau gets comfortable and then brings me in close to his side. He’s big and warm and safe-feeling.

  He makes a noise somewhere between a growl and a moan as I shift to find the right spot. “I like it when you rub up against me like that.”

  “I’m trying to get comfortable.”

  “Roll on your side.” I do, and he spoons me from behind. “Better?”

  “Except for that thing poking me.”

  He laughs. “That’s what happens when you rub against me. Ignore it. It’ll go away.”

  In a matter of moments he’s asleep, but I lie awake, thinking about the things we did and what he told me. There’s so much more to him than I originally thought. I don’t know what happened to him today to make him come here instead of going to Cora or a friend. Did he get what he was looking for, what he needed? I got something I didn’t even know I wanted or needed. A lot more. His arm is tight around me and there isn’t an inch of me that doesn’t feel him. He’s invaded my body and my mind and completely taken over my life.

  I’m so far out of my depth with him. I don’t know what to do with him and I don’t want to do without him. Whatever this is between us is the biggest thing that’s ever happened to me. It feels inevitable, like we’re opposite poles of a magnet, drawn toward each other by some unseen force. If either of us tried to walk away, some other circumstances would force us back together. From that first moment in the reception area of the office, we connected. Maybe it’s just for the time being. Maybe we’ll get what we want or need from each other, then move on. But right now we’re exactly where we’re supposed to be.

  The past few years I’ve learned a lot about trying to live in the moment and to just be. It’s taken me a long time to get here. When I think about all I’ve been through, it feels as though it happened to a different person. And yet when I read Marie’s Tumblr I was brought right back to where I started. Maybe I need to go back to go forward. I drift off to sleep, thinking about how
far I’ve come and how much farther I still have to go and what part Beau will play.

  —

  I wake up to someone pounding on my skull with a thousand little hammers. The room is dark, but daylight glows around the edges of the curtains. What time is it? I try to move, but I’m pinned down. Beau’s arm is banded around me just under my breasts. His leg weighs down my legs. He faces away from me on his stomach, snoring loud enough to wake the whole motel. The sound is doing terrible things to the inside of my head. Next to me the clock reads six fifteen. My mouth feels like it’s been stuffed with cotton, then glued shut. I need the bathroom and a glass of water in that order. I shove at Beau, but he doesn’t respond. I try shouting as loud as my head will let me and push at him. I manage to get him to stop snoring for about two seconds, then he goes back to splitting my eardrums.

  I raise my hand as high as I can get it and smack him hard on his bare ass. He jumps.

  Groaning, he grips his head. “Fuuuuuck.”

  I jab him with my elbow. “Get off me so I can pee.”

  He moves his leg, still complaining about his head, and I slip out of bed and do my business. I come back with two glasses of water and a bottle of painkillers. Beau’s on his back, rubbing his eyes, making grumbling noises about all the drinking we did last night.

  “Here.” I give him a glass and pour four pills into his hand.

  I take some too and down the whole glass of water, then climb back into bed. Closing my eyes, I wait for the painkillers to do their work, trying to move as little as possible.

  “Getting drunk sucks,” Beau says and groans. “Why do people do it?”

  “It was fun last night.”

  “But not worth it this morning. My fucking head.”

  “Quieter, please.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m trying real hard to keep the pills down.”

  “No, I mean about what we did.”

  Cracking an eye, I turn to look at him. “The sex stuff?”

  “Yeah.” There’s a deep crease between his brows.

  I throw an arm over my eyes and try to focus on not vomiting in front of him. “I’m fine. It was great. You’re a god. Blah, blah, blah.”