by Emma Scott
Kacey rummaged in the fridge, and I was afforded a generous glimpse of the smooth, flawless skin on the backs of her legs before she turned around and handed me a bottle of green tea with lemon and honey.
“Green tea is the healthiest thing ever, apparently. Personally, I never drink iced tea unless it’s of the Long Island variety, but I thought we’d give it a shot.”
I set my bottle on the counter and watched her shake the pot that was now bursting with popcorn. “When did you go grocery shopping?”
“While you were at the hot shop this afternoon. I love Tania, by the way. She’s a quality human.”
“Yes, she is,” I said.
“Popcorn’s ready,” Kacey said. She dumped it all into a larger bowl, eyeing me up and down. “What’s with you tonight, anyway?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re kind of scattered. Something on your mind?”
“I’m just shocked you did all this.”
“That I went to the grocery store? Or that I braved the heat? I guess I have a lot of work left to do in the responsibility arena if buying popcorn and drinks comes as a shock.”
“Shocked was the wrong choice of words. I meant, I’m touched you did all this. For me.”
“It’s the least I could do since you let me crash here.”
She smiled at me and I smiled back, until the moment grew too long for friends to be smiling at one another. I tried some of the popcorn.
“How’s the fake salt?” she asked.
“Not bad.”
We moved our food and drinks to the couch. I sat at one end figuring Kacey would sit at the other. Instead, she set the popcorn bowl in her lap and curled up right next to me, tucking her legs under her. She was flush against me, shoulder to shoulder, her left breast soft against my arm.
“Is this okay?” she asked, taking up the TV remote. “It’s a horror movie, for one thing. And I’m kind of touchy-feely.”
“I noticed.” I could feel every place where we touched. “Why?”
“Ready for some pop psychology? My dad was a big believer in withholding physical affection. He hardly ever touched or hugged me. And he was always badgering my mom not to go overboard and coddle me. It would only make me weak and soft.”
“Are you serious?” My imagination conjured a sweet little girl, running up to her dad with a scraped knee or with an A on a spelling test and being coldly rebuffed. “Your dad never hugged you?”
She shook her head. “But his little plan backfired. Instead of making me tough, I went the other way. I want to touch everyone. To make contact, you know?”
“Is that why you hug people when you meet them? Like Tania, today?”
“I don’t hug everyone. Only good people. I have a sixth sense about it.”
“You didn’t hug Theo yesterday,” I said. “He’s a good guy.”
“Can you blame me? He looked like he wanted to bite my head off.” The glow of the TV turned Kacey’s eyes electric blue. “But he’s a good guy. I wanted to hug him but I don’t think he would’ve liked that. I don’t think he likes me.”
“He doesn’t trust easily,” I said. “I’m sure he likes you fine.”
Kacey turned to look at me, and because she was practically sitting in my lap, her face was inches from mine. Her face was open, her features even more striking this close, free of the elaborate makeup she usually wore.
“Why would he need to trust me?” she asked.
Shit. Good question. “He doesn’t trust anyone new around me,” I said, infusing my words with as much nonchalance as possible. “Since my surgery, he’s become ridiculously overprotective.”
“Why? I mean, aside from the obvious reasons.”
“My regimen is pretty severe and he worries I’ll become distracted.”
“He’s worried I’ll corrupt you? Take you out for steak and booze?”
I glanced at this girl who wasn’t used to being trusted and heard myself say, “He doesn’t trust women around me. Because of Audrey. My last girlfriend.”
Now Kacey sat up and turned her full attention toward me. “Audrey. Is she the girl…?” She pointed at a framed shot of Audrey and me at Carnegie that hung on the wall next to the AC unit.
“That’s her,” I said. “We were together for three years. We traveled a lot and planned to keep traveling after graduation. To see the great cities of the world and be inspired by their art.”
“She worked in glass too?”
“No, a painter. We had a life planned out, and then it fell apart and she didn’t know how to cope with the chaos. She was with me in South America when I got sick, and flew home with me while I waited for a donor heart. But being around illness or hanging around hospitals wasn’t her thing.”
Kacey leaned back, a shadow crossing her face. “What happened?”
“She stuck it out until I got the call that a heart had come available.”
Kacey’s eyes widened, “She left? While you were about to have a heart transplant?”
“More or less,” I said. “But the upshot is, she told Theo she was leaving and it turned him into a paranoid guard dog…”
“What about you?” Kacey cut in.
I tensed. “What about me?”
“She left. Is that why you stick so religiously to your schedule? To protect yourself?”
Words stuck in my throat and I could only nod.
“I’m sorry if that’s personal,” she said. “I was thinking about how we’ve both been hurt by people who were supposed to love us. I protect myself too. By drinking, partying, making loud music.” She turned back to face the television. “I hate that people leave when they’re supposed to stay.”
I nodded, at a loss for words. We watched the movie and ate our popcorn, while the minutes ticked closer to tomorrow.
Onscreen, a young woman thrashed in her bed. Her boyfriend screamed as the girl died a bloody death, her body dragged up the wall and cut to ribbons by unseen hands.
Kacey buried her face in my shoulder. “Tell me when it’s over,” she said, her voice muffled.
“What, this scene?”
She nodded against me, clutching my arm. Her hair was soft against my cheek.
On the TV, the boyfriend’s screaming stopped. “Okay, she’s a goner,” I said.
Kacey turned her head to peek at the screen with one eye, then both. “Sorry. I’m a total wimp about horror movies.”
“It was your idea.”
“It’s a great movie.”
“But you’re scared to even watch it.”
“So?” Her challenging eyes were bright and vibrant, as if backlit with a cerulean light. “What’s your point?”
“No, nothing,” I laughed, shaking my head. “Makes total sense.”
Kacey elbowed my side, then curled into it again.
She felt so soft and warm against me, while I was a brick wall with my hands tucked under my crossed arms to keep from seeking her. I wanted to fill my hands with Kacey; hold hers, or lay my palm on the bare skin of her thigh that was pressed against mine. Or put my arm around her because—my God—wasn’t this the last time I’d ever sit on a couch with a girl and watch a movie again? Have her hide her head in my shoulder during the scary parts, or share a bowl of popcorn? This was my life, what was left of it, and I was missing it.
I tried to lose myself in the movie. Minutes ticked by. Onscreen, a young, feathered-haired Johnny Depp failed to stay awake despite certain death. “You had one job, Johnny,” I intoned.
Kacey buried her face in my shoulder, her fingers clenched around my arm, as Johnny was sucked into his bed and a geyser of blood erupted to spray the room.
“Tell me when it’s over.”
“How would I know if it’s over?” I said, laughing. “You’ve already seen this.”
“Twice.”
“All right, the screaming’s stopped, you can come out.”
Kacey lifted her head and Jesus, she was so beautiful. Her laughing eyes exhilarated,
as if she’d just gotten off a rollercoaster.
Her beauty sucked my breath away. If I kept sitting here with her, I was going to do something stupid. Something unfair to the both of us.
I got up, muttering about needing the bathroom. I felt all long the right side of my body an unpleasant coolness where she had been touching me and now she was not. In the bathroom, I stared at my reflection in the mirror.
“Keep to the routine, Fletcher. The fucking routine.”
That mantra was a frail, rickety bridge between what I wanted and what I would never have. It would fall to pieces in a stiff wind, but it was the only bridge I had. Without it, I would free-fall to nothing.
“Keep. To. The. Routine.”
When I returned to the living room, Kacey sat up, yawning and stretching. She smiled when she saw me. A surprised smile. As if we hadn’t spent all evening hanging out together. As if I’d been years away in Africa and not two minutes in the john.
But I felt it too. I missed her. Every time I closed my fucking eyes, I missed her.
I stood apart from her, staring, while in my mind I closed the distance between us, took her down to the couch cushions again, but this time, I lay over her. Kissing her luscious mouth, tasting her tongue as it slid over mine. Her thighs parted for me, revealing panties that were damp when I touched her…
Jesus Christ…
I took shelter behind the kitchen counter so Kacey wouldn’t see the raging hard-on tenting the front of my flannel pants.
“I’m getting some more ice for my tea,” I muttered. “Need some?”
“Sure.”
I opened the freezer and stayed there, inhaling the cold air until my blood had cooled and it was safe to turn around.
Or maybe I could slam my dick in the door…
“How’s that drink doing ya?” I asked, cringing as the words left my mouth. Clearly, the blood had yet to return to my brain. “I mean, how is it without something harder to drink than iced tea?”
“Not bad,” she said. “Actually, it’s been pretty easy to lay off the booze these last few days. I thought I’d be jonesing, but here I feel like I can chill. I don’t need the buffer.”
“Buffer?”
“The booze buffer. The one that goes up between yourself and real life when you’re drunk. Everything is so much easier to take. Easier to not give a shit. You can put yourself at a safe distance.”
“Safe distance from what?”
She shrugged and glanced at the couch cushions beneath her. “Life. The life I’ve found myself living. A life that happened to me, instead of one I made.” She became intent on a stray thread, winding it over her finger. “Vegas is different than I thought it would be. After all that shit that went down with Chett, I thought it would be haunted. But it’s not so bad. Better than being on the road with the band. I can see that now. So I was thinking I might…” The thread on her finger went round and round. “Stay.”
The blood drained from my face so fast I had to grip the counter.
Stay.
The word hung in the air. A crystal bubble of perfection.
She’s going to stay. I can see her every day, I can talk to her, I can touch her…
My thoughts ran rampant, carried on the rapid tide of my pulse that was buzzing in my ears. It was so loud, I could hardly hear Kacey’s next words. But I felt them. I felt each word; little bullets that struck me, each with a new emotion: fear and joy and guilt and something damn close to happiness.
“I think I want to quit the band,” she said, still concentrating on her loose thread. “I’m under contract and I have no idea if it’s even possible to get out of it without being sued. But I think I might try. I think I might do what you said. Try to put all the pieces together. Write my own songs and sing them myself. Of course, I’d have to get a regular job in the meantime, but that would be good for me too.”
Her face…She wore a look of conviction I’d never seen before, her voice was clear and strong, as she built a life for herself here.
A life with me?
“I’d get my own place and take care of myself,” she was saying. “Instead of letting Lola handle all the responsibility. Pay my own bills, go back for my GED. Stand on my own two feet for a change…”
Her words trailed off and she looked over at me. She saw my stricken expression and all her hope vanished. It slipped from her features like a mask and the light burning in her eyes dimmed.
“Anyway,” she said, and cleared her throat. “Like I said, I don’t know if it’s possible. I’m probably locked into my contract.”
Still I said nothing, a thousand thoughts warring, a thousand words locked in my mouth.
Kacey swallowed hard, and lifted her chin up against my silence. “Never mind, it’s a stupid idea.” She threw the pillow aside and flew off the couch, toward the bedroom. “And I’m not feeling well. I’m going to hit the sack. Goodnight.”
The door slamming shut jumpstarted my synapses. “Kace, wait.”
In my room, she had her duffel bag on the bed and was grabbing clothes out of the drawers.
“Wait,” I said. “Stop. I’m sorry. We need to talk about this.”
“You don’t have to say anything,” she said. “I fucking get it. I read it all over your face. Only you’re wrong. Dead wrong.”
“Wrong?”
“You’ve got that scared shitless look guys get when the girl starts talking marriage and babies on the first date.” She threw her clothes in the bag, piece by piece. “But let me tell you something: me wanting to move here is not a marriage proposal. I don’t want your babies. We’re not even dating. And I don’t want to date you. At this moment, the last fucking thing I want to do on this earth is date you.”
The words stung, but I hardly felt them. The possibility of her moving here both scared me to my bones and lit up the shadowy places in my heart.
It’s my heart, dude, and you’re wasting it.
God, the chaotic hope and dread of the situation was making me dizzy, and now I was hallucinating my donor’s voice. I shook my head to clear it out.
“What…would you really quit the band?”
“Yes, Jonah, I really would.” She planted her hands on her hips. “Are you that shocked? I told you things I haven’t told anyone. I told you everything. How I was unhappy…and scared…”
“You did. And I hoped you’d quit. But I didn’t think you’d move here.”
She flinched at that, and her jaw clenched against the tears in her eyes.
“Dammit.” I scrubbed my hands over my face. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
“No? What did you mean?”
We faced off, her waiting for an answer and me trying to quell the chaos that raged in me. The push and pull of wanting her to stay and what lay ahead if she did.
“You hate the desert,” I said finally. “And the heat. And this city.”
“I never said that.”
“I believe your exact words were, I fucking hate Las Vegas.”
She stared at me, pain etched into every contour of her face. My arguments were stupid and empty and we both knew it. We’d known each other only a few days but we had a connection.
“Look, let me explain,” I said. “I didn’t mean—”
“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “It doesn’t matter what I said, or what you said. None of what we ever said to each other means anything. So you’re safe, okay? I won’t distract your work or disrupt your precious schedule anymore.”
“Kace…”
“I didn’t think about moving back here for you,” she said, her voice cracking now. “Let’s just get that clear. I had this crazy idea I’d actually face all the horrible heartache Chett caused me, in the city where he ditched me. Or write about my dad and exorcise that particular fucking demon with a song. Or ten. Or a hundred. However many it takes until I get it out. I thought I’d try being on my own for the first time in my life. I thought I’d get serious about my music. And I thought, maybe, I’d
have a friend I could call and hang out with sometime.” She zipped her bag shut. “But I was wrong.”
“You weren’t wrong,” I said, rubbing my tired eyes.
“No? You have a funny way of showing it.” She took up her duffel and shouldered her purse, still wearing her sleep shorts and a T-shirt. Bare feet at one in the morning, and tears threatening to break.
“Kace,” I said softly. “Where are you going?”
“I’m not staying here,” she said. “I’ll get a cab back to Summerlin. Back…”
The tears spilled over and her shoulders crumpled at the weight of her life that fit entirely in one small duffel.
I moved close to her, took the duffel from her hand and the bag from her shoulder, and let them drop to the floor. I wrapped my arms around her. She stiffened, then melted against me. I held her as she cried against my chest. A full-blown ugly cry, because she knew it was okay to cry like that. With me.
“I’m so scared,” she whispered. “I’m scared of what I want…of going after it and fucking it all up again. Scared of having to call my parents or Lola…crawling back to them for help because I had the opportunity of a lifetime in the palm of my hand and I threw it away.” She held on to me tighter. “I’m scared that I’m so busy being scared that I’ll never be anything at all.”
I stroked her hair. “You will. You’ll find it. You can be scared and still find it. I know you can. And I don’t want you to think I wouldn’t be happy to have you here in Vegas. I would. I want you to stay but—”
“I don’t expect you to take care of me,” she said. “I just need a friend to tell me I’m not crazy. And I was hoping that friend was you.”
“I can be that friend, but…”
Oh shit, here it is…
My heart pounded and adrenaline raced through my veins.
“I have to tell you something.”
“What?”
My jaw worked and no sound came out. I had nothing planned. No standard speech. I kept people away so I didn’t have to tell them. But now here was Kacey…
She looked up at me. Her eyes were beautiful and shining, and filled with trust I hadn’t earned. I almost told her to forget it. That I was an asshole, and she’d be better off not speaking to me ever again.
