by Skye Grace
Chapter Fourteen
As soon as the cool night air hits her, she’s struck with the realization that she has grown into the adult now, while Inner-Aura is totally entrenched in the past. The power this frozen, fractured girl still holds over her takes her breath away. She steels herself, focusing on defeating what she feels is more of an enemy than an ally now. Don’t make me think about Jameson, not here! Not now! Don’t you dare ruin this for me! she demands in her mind, while musing that schizophrenia would be a more fitting diagnosis than amnesia.
She has to clamp a hand on a piece of the brick building to keep herself from being lunged into the next cab that stops outside the club. I can’t be out here, Aura, by myself outside some nasty goth club? What were you thinking? Get in a cab and go home. Rather be dead than hang out with those two little lovebirds.
You need to get over it or get out, hopefully the latter, she counters. You help me through Liam and now you’re sabotaging something real with Jacksen? Because you, WE, got dumped years ago? You can’t keep running away when things are hard, not if it’s worth it.
Thud! An all-encompassing pain envelopes her skull as THWACK! Pissed off Inner-Aura hurls her into the nearest hard surface to make a point - Get me away from here or else. And else hurts pretty bad, it turns out.
Her head hits first against the brick wall as the rest of her follows. Her hands fly up to her head as she groans into the ache. It takes her a few seconds to look up and notice a few people turning their eyes in her direction. The threats in her mind are ringing clear. She hates to give her other half what she wants, but she’s got to get off the street. Aura stands upright and throws herself into the nearest open door.
The metaphysical shop she finds herself in is almost exactly like the one her Aunt Kari owned while she was growing up. The nag champa floods her senses and calm creeps over her as she is surrounded by the bundles of sage, the crystals, the how-to guides to astral projection.
“Oh, we’re not still open! Sorry, must’ve forgot to lock the door. Just had to try out these new cards-”
The woman’s silvery grey eyes that match her long, glittering hair grow wide and her hands fly up to the cocoa-colored skin of her forehead, dropping the tarot cards.
“I definitely don’t need those to read you, darling.” The woman reaches out and takes Aura’s hands in hers. “My name is Sabine and damn girl, I was about to go home! But you need my help don’t you?”
“Rather desperately,” she admits. “I’m Aura,” she adds, falling into the nearest chair with Sabine’s gentle hands still wrapped around hers. Releasing her hands, the older woman turns to a small, round table covered in a fringed scarf and plucks something out of a shallow basket there. Sabine tosses Aura one of the most beautiful, shimmering, somehow ever-changing rainbow rocks she's ever seen.
“Angel Aura,” Sabine laughs softly, explaining the name of the quartz to it’s new owner. “Must be named after you.” Aura thanks her profusely.
Sabine sits down to face her, kind eyes baffled as they search hers for a little clarity on her multitude of problems.
“Are you off your meds, sweet girl? There’s clearly more than one of you here.”
“No meds, no, never. I mean, no anti-psychotics. That I can remember. But it’s more than one of me, yeah. It turns out two’s actually a crowd.” She rubs the throbbing goose egg on the back of her head and Sabine grabs a nearby crystal, small and pointed with swirls of violet and white. She holds it close to Aura’s scalp and she feels the pain dissipate, just slightly.
“Can that help my problem, at all?” Aura asks.
“This? Goddess, no, no, I mean it can’t hurt. But we need something stronger. Here, hold this here for the pain,” Sabine hands her the amethyst and walks to a wall of expansive shelves, each full of stones of every color, shape, and size. Aura watches as the woman grabs little hunks of Lepidolite, Ruby, Sugilite and Emerald, tossing them into a tall glass of water and swirling the gems around as they tinkle together. “Drink this while I look in the back.”
She can feels her skin pulsing with a forcefield of energy, feel the malicious Inner-Aura’s strength waning already as the charged water overtakes her senses yet calms her at the same time. She makes a mental note to call her mother in the morning, She was right about the crystals, too? God, she deserves some sort of mom award.
After a few minutes of shuffling, Sabine pops her head out of the back. “Have you ever held the black phantom quartz, my little lost girl?” she asks.
In her hand she holds a crystal wand, about the length of her palm, its mixture of inky onyx and unearthly transparency transfixing Aura. She shakes her head no. Sabine brings it closer and Inner-Aura is instantly silenced. It’s finally quiet.
“Any quartz holds power,” she explains, “but the black phantom is different. It holds the power to put both of you back together. Do you realize how long you’ve been living in your shadow self? Hiding your true self from the world?”
“Let me guess, ten years?”
“At least!” Sabine rolls the wand in her hands, “Maybe your entire, short life, girl! Keeping inside that shadow drains your life force. This,” she points the crystal at her, “can shed light on the dark areas of yourself, the one always saying you’re not good enough.”
“She’s just so angry, Sabine, this other part of me,” Aura sighs, “Wiser, yeah. But so bitter. I don’t want to be like this. If you merge the two of us, won’t I be just as pissed off as her? And constantly conflicted?”
“This can only help, Aura. It will bring you closer to whole, and quiet the anger, for now. But if you want to really become one, and trust me you do, you have to heal her, not just hide her, dear. I can tell that’s what you want. For you to be happy, and in one piece.”
“If the crystal’s a band-aid, what do I do to fix this? Permanently?”
“You’ll come to a place where you’ve got to come together to become stronger, rise to the occasion and become better than either side of you has ever been. If you can’t, I’m afraid everything will fall apart. Everything either of you have ever wanted. I can tell you have the world tickling at your fingertips, girl. You can do this if you want it enough. For now, you have to keep this on you at all times, until this situation arises.”
Aura holds out her hand and jumps out of her seat as the rock hits her palm and the twinkling chimes above the door alarm her that she and Sabine are no longer alone.
“Aura?” Jacksen asks cautiously, his eyes darting around the room until he walks farther in and spots the two of them.
Sabine attempts to stand to greet the handsome man entering her shop, but is knocked back on her seat by the telepathic energy radiating from him, bowled over by an ability stronger than she’s ever come across.
“How are you two more powerful than you are pretty?” she manages to say after catching her breath. Jacksen eyes both women carefully for a moment before introducing himself, if rather formally, to Sabine. They seem equally impressed with the other, chatting about the shop amicably, but Aura can tell what they’re really doing is reading each other. Thinking back to earlier when Aura thought Jacksen was just a normal guy she’d have to play down her crazy for, she breathes in just how wrong she really was.
She grips onto her chair tighter as the conversation turns and the questions pile up in her brain.
“Is this going to help her?” Jacksen asks Sabine, gesturing towards the crystal smoldering in her delicate grasp.
“It will help you just as much as it will her, my love. You know a thing or two about hiding in the shadows, yourself. Hiding in plain sight.”
Jacksen nods and glances at Aura, her eyes transfixed on him like he’s the universe’s best kept secret.
“I only have one black phantom,” Sabine admits, “I want to tell you that you must keep close to it, to her, but something tells me you won’t have a problem with that at all.”
He smiles at her softly and then moves to Aura, just barely setting
his hand down on hers, over the crystal, when the wind gets fiercely knocked from his lungs. He lands on his ass, blinking in confusion, as the two women kneel down next to him, crowding around to see exactly what the hell just happened.
Jacksen’s head spins, “Think I deserve a big, fat ‘I told you so,’ right about now. I really did think these things were just rocks.”
Back outside the club, Jacksen stops her, guilt seeping from his perfect pores. “I’m so sorry, I never should have made you come here. It’s our first date, we didn’t need any other couple. Especially-”
All she wants is to ask him about what Sabine said in the shop. How he seemed to know what was up with her, what Sabine meant by him being so powerful yet hiding his true self in the shadows? But she knows the timing isn’t right.
“They’re like your family, Jacksen.”
“Yours now, too,” he adds.
“Exactly. I freaked out a little back there. About the past, but I’m okay now, I promise. We’re all a part of something bigger, I know that.”
“I’m still sorry.”
“Don’t be, please. I want to go back in, really,” she pushes towards the door. Jacksen quickly steps ahead in order to open it for her.
“Okay, but if you want to leave, let me know and we’ll be cruising the PCH as soon as you say when.”
Gabby and Jameson rush them instantly, having been by themselves long enough in this place. Gabby hands Aura her drink and practically bounces with excitement. “What would happen if we asked the DJ to play Monroe? You think we can do it?” Gabby asks her, giddy. God, are we really still talking about this?
Her dark eyes have neon laser lights bouncing off of them and Aura takes the chance, nods, and Gabby is grabbing her hand and pulling her towards the DJ booth. They worm their way through the crowd of writhing bodies up to the over-enthused DJ who is spinning goth songs from when Aura was an alternagirl back in high school, along with songs that are a lot harder; the stuff that ‘scared’ Gabby. She has no idea how Gabby’s going to convince him to play something so poppy. But it is danceable, she will give her that.
Amazingly, the DJ is an avid, ‘Protectors,’ fan, and does everything aside from bowing down at Gabby’s feet. Problem solved. She doesn’t have to ask twice. He immediately plays one of Monroe’s edgier songs and she’s suddenly being dragged somehow by this tiny person back onto the dance floor.
She hates how infectious Gabby’s positive energy is, and she also hates that the more she bops up and down and smiles at her, the less she hates her at all. Either Inner-Aura is listed MIA or is somehow absorbing into her. Either way, she’s quiet now.
It’s really not her fault, not even a little bit, that Jameson fell for her while he was still talking to me. It’s not like we were even remotely exclusive, separated by an entire country, and she never knew any of that anyway, I’m sure. You can’t be mad at her anymore, just try and have a good time.
She doesn’t have to talk herself into it for very long, because she soon realizes that despite feeling like the 50 Foot Woman next to this girl, she is having a good time. She dances as hard as she can in the mega heels and can almost keep up with the spritely entity that is Gabrielle DeLano-Peters.
After the song ends, amazingly, the DJ plays another one for them and Gabby squeaks, “I’ll be right back! Gonna get something for you!”
She downs her drink thinking Gabby is coming back with another for her, but instead she returns dragging Jameson, and Jacksen is walking ahead of them, straight towards her, apparently of his own free will.
The last thing she expects is Mr. Cool to come up to her on this sweaty dance floor, miraculously still crowded despite the world’s most ragingly girly disco pop playing, and lock his hands around her waist. And start. Moving. His. Hips.
Those hips. Swaying. And not ironically, either. Aura doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but they move closer, against hers now, and she doesn’t say anything at all.
Gabby and Jameson’s bodies slow, staring at Jacksen and Aura in differing states of subdued shock. Gabby had loved Yvonne, practically like a sister, having been pleased to grow even half as close to her as Jameson was to Jacksen. But when she’d left him, them, and the whole damn country behind, for that matter, for Mr. Old French Billionaire that will continue to remain nameless, she was left torn. Missing her friend, yet so angry and confused. And as excited as she was to meet Aura, her favorite actress on her favorite show on The Network, the last thing she expected was to see Jacksen getting so close with her, so quickly.
She looks at her husband with questioning eyes and he shrugs, he can’t begin to explain this to her, or to himself for that matter, even if he tried. They had both been hurting for Jacksen for months, attempting to nurse him back to health, but the idea of him only finding solace in the arms of the last woman Jameson ever slept with in his single years? It was more than a little unnerving to him. He couldn’t bring himself to relive those memories of her after yesterday, but the thought of her doing all of that, with Jacksen, bothers him in a way he has no right to be bothered by. He tears his eyes away from them and refocuses on the correct target, his beautiful wife.
“I never would have taken you for a techno, girl power ballad kinda guy.” She smirks at Jacksen to cover how her insides are liquefying, breaking the boiling point with every inch his hand moves: up to her waist, inch, inch. Down to her hip, inch, inch. Thumb hooking just slightly where her hipbone meets soft stomach. He brings his lips to her ear, again, Jacksen Andrews’ lips are on my ear. On my ear!
“I would listen to ‘Boogie Oogie Oogie’ and hell, even dance to it, if it meant getting this close to you Aura. I haven’t felt this good since… I don’t know when.”
She peels back enough to look in his eyes, laser laced green now, and searches for a marker of sincerity that wasn’t there with Liam. Something to show her this isn’t the same, that it wouldn’t end up like that failed attempt at love did. Aside from the fact that Jacksen is just moving so fast and it doesn’t even bother her, something else was worrying her much more. Liam had tricked her. How could she know for sure that Jacksen wasn’t doing the same? Using her not as a cover like Liam had but maybe as a rebound this time?
Her thoughts float to Yvonne, who was also a TV actress although Aura had never seen her in anything. She knows what she looks like though, from what she’d Googled. Could I be just a slightly younger and I doubt I could say prettier version of her? God she’s beautiful but is that what I am to him? Just someone to parade around to prove he’s over her or make her jealous? Just because I was stupid enough to fall for it once doesn’t mean I can’t find a way to smell bullshit this time around.
All she can think of to ask is, How can I know that you’re real? That any of this is real? How do I know you won’t hurt me? And how do you know so much without being told a word? She begins parting her lips to ask the questions she so desperately wants the answers to, but before she can speak them, Jacksen’s lips are suddenly crashing into hers. The flaming memories she felt rolling off of Jameson earlier now feel like mere embers compared to the fire raging inside her chest, flowing from her lips straight to her heart and then everywhere else, all at once.
The tip of his tongue flashes across her lips like the striking of a match, her brain too numb to compute the question attempting to break its way through the anesthesia. Does any of this feel fake to you? she attempts to ask herself. Not a single thought has to be worked through for her to know that none of this feels fake, not even a little bit.
As Jacksen brings the Jag to a stop in Aura’s driveway, gallantly opening her door and offering her his hand, she envisions the strong woman that she wants so badly to be. The one she could be becoming right now. She figures the key is to be as independent as you need to be, but when someone sincerely offers you their time, their attention, their chivalrous intentions like this, you really should accept it graciously.
They stop at her doorstep and she sighs, “I don’t
understand how you do this… blow away expectations like this.”
Jacksen laughs softly, reaching up and running his fingers carefully over and not through Aura’s hair, as not to upset the hairspray gods, and replies, “I know the feeling.”
He takes another step closer, hand resting on her shoulder now. “I want to apologize again for the detour tonight. Yesterday Jameson reminded me that he knows you, from before. If I had known, back then, about you two… well, I totally forgot. But it didn’t bother me, it just made me wonder. What I remember from that time is pretty vague, but I’m really not convinced that then, or anything happening now, is a coincidence at all.”
“There you go, doing it again.”
“I’m sorry,” he grins, hand in her hair again. “I just… How… Tell me, please. What was going through your mind when you asked your agent to call Constellation?”
“You.” The honesty paws at her solar plexus but she doesn’t break their gaze.
A smile creeps over Jacksen’s lips as he takes a step towards her, closing the gap between their bodies. His lips are on hers again, fingers tangled in her hair now, and she couldn’t care less about the state of her tresses. His tongue parts her lips and presses against hers deeply, while he backs her up against the front door. Her fingers grips his hair tightly as she sinks into him, eventually breaking away to take a deep breath and elaborate.
“I couldn’t think of anything I wanted more than to be a part of this, and I thought if you just saw my Bianca to your Blaise, then-”
“Then I’d get it. The Jacksen to your Aura,” he completes the thought but shakes his head a little, thinking how silly it is that she thought she needed to convince him of anything. He was already sold.
She looks at him earnestly, “No one is this perceptive, Jacksen. No one I’ve met, anyway. And all I need is honesty, so please give me that.” She swallows hard. “Are you… Are you reading my thoughts? Damn it, that’s one of the more ridiculous things I’ve said out loud…”
