Searching for Neverland

by Alexander, Monica

  “Everything okay, princess?” he asked.

  She nodded. “I’m fine. Just tired. How’s Lily?”

  He smirked to himself. “She’s a freakin’ handful according to Jen, but she told me she loved me and she said to ‘tell Emmy wub you’.” He shook his head. “I miss her.”

  “Aww,” Emily said, sinking deeper into his side. “I miss her so much.”

  And it was suddenly like the rest of us weren’t in the room. Emily and Zack were so in tune with each other that it felt like we were invading their space.

  “Lily is Zack’s daughter,” Molly explained to Josh and me. “She’s almost two and a half.”

  I nodded.

  “Oh, she’s so cute,” Emily gushed. “Tare, you want to see pictures? Jen sends a few every couple of days. She’s getting so big!”

  Emily pulled Taryn to the side, so she could show her pictures of Zack’s daughter, and I wondered what it would be like to have a kid when you were barely out of college. Scary thought.

  “Josh, Taylor, this is my cousin, Zack Easton, and the lead singer and guitarist of Liar’s Edge,” Molly said then, introducing us to Zack, who just looked like he stood on stage with a guitar in his hand, belting out lyrics on a regular basis. He totally had that rock star vibe about him. “Josh and I used to sleep together. Do you remember meeting him?”

  I started coughing as Josh pleaded with Molly, the anger ebbing into his voice. “Stop bringing that up, please,” he said firmly.

  “Sorry,” Molly said to him. “Last time. I swear.” Then she looked at me. “It didn’t mean anything, I swear. We were high most of the time anyway.”

  I looked over at Josh and raised my eyebrows at him, as if to ask ‘What the hell else don’t I know about you?’

  Josh just pulled me against his chest and held on like he was afraid I’d bolt if given the opportunity.

  Zack looked at Josh for a few seconds before recognition dawned on him. “Oh yeah, that was like three years ago. Shit, that was a fucked up summer. We did a hell of a lot of X. How are you, man?” he asked, as he reached forward to shake Josh’s hand.

  Josh extended a hand, but kept me firmly latched to his side.

  “So, I hear you guys are pretty amazing. I love your song, Jump,” I interjected, not wanting to have a visual of Josh high on ecstasy, fucking Molly’s brains out.

  Zack rubbed his chin in his hand and shook his head. “I’m still not sure we should have gone commercial. I feel like a fucking sellout.”

  Then he reached behind his ear for what looked like clove cigarette and stuck it in his mouth. Emily was by his side in an instant.

  “I know,” he said, giving her a look that told her she didn’t need to say anything. She just looked adoringly back at him and shook her head.

  “You quit, then I quit. Neither of us is starting back up again, got it?”

  “Got it, princess,” he said, as he leaned down and kissed the tip of her nose before placing the cigarette back behind his ear.

  She smiled. “The reporter from the Tampa paper is here for the interview you and Leo promised him. He’s outside in the hallway.” She gestured to the door we’d come through. “Get started, and I’ll meet you in a minute.”

  “Nice to meet you guys,” Zack said before he left. “Stick around after the show. We’d love to hang out some more.”

  “It was nice meeting you,” Josh said, shaking his hand. “And hey, just remember The Black Keys made it big because of their music being in commercials, and that song by Imagine Dragons has been tied to a few commercials and movie trailers this summer alone.”

  Zack paused, listening to Josh. “Thanks, man. I appreciate that.”

  Josh nodded his head. “You got it.”

  “He seems stressed,” Molly said to Emily as soon as Zack had disappeared out the door.

  Emily nodded. “He is. It’s hard being away from Lily, and with the pace we’ve been going, I don’t know when we’ll get home again in the next few weeks.”

  “I’ll move some things around,” Molly said automatically, her eyes never leaving Zack as he slipped out the door. “Maybe from Miami, you guys can fly back home and then meet us in Tuscaloosa.”

  Emily nodded. “He’d appreciate that.” Then she turned to us. “Sorry things are so crazy back here, but this is life, pre-show.” She shook her head. “There are beers in the fridge and snacks on top. Just don’t touch Derrick’s pork rinds. He’s weird about them.”

  “I need to go check in with the sound engineer,” Molly said then, as her gaze drifted toward the faint sounds coming from the stage. “There’s feedback coming from the left front speaker, and no one seems to be hearing it.”

  As soon as she was gone, Taryn told us she was going to get a soda. I think she might have been sensing that Josh and I needed to talk. He pulled me into a corner, and although he didn’t let go, he did loosen his grip around me.

  He dropped his forehead to mine. “I love you, Taylor. That’s all you need to know, okay?”

  I took a deep breath. I knew I’d acted like I didn’t care, and quite honestly I didn’t, but a little part of me felt like I didn’t really know Josh, and that didn’t sit right with me.

  “So, let me piece together what happened three years ago, and I’m guessing, right before you moved back here.” He nodded. “You went to the beach on vacation, met Molly, spent two weeks getting high and having sex. Is that the gist?”

  He nodded glumly. “I only did ecstasy the first night, but yeah, the sex part is accurate. It wasn’t my proudest moment, but to my credit I’d been dealing with some pretty big life stuff that summer that I didn’t want to face. I was a little lost and needed a really good distraction, and Molly was that.”

  “Are you still attracted to her?”

  “No,” he said quickly, but it sounded completely sincere. “I wasn’t kidding when I said I’ve been in love with you for a while, Tay. I meant that, and although I can’t change the past, I can work my hardest to prove to you that you’re the only girl I want to think about for the rest of my life.”

  My eyebrows rose in surprise, and Josh gave me a nervous, smirky smile.

  “I knew I’d catch you off guard with that one.”

  “But you’re Josh Nolan, the eternal bachelor, the boy who never wants to grow up. You’re the guy who bolts after a girl mentions living together, forget ring shopping or babies. Are you seriously telling me you’re thinking about a long term commitment?”

  He pulled me close again. “Swift, I’m thinking about the long term commitment – with you.”

  “But we’ve only been together for twenty-four hours.”

  “Twenty-seven,” he corrected me, his mouth quirking up on the left side. “And longer if you count from Saturday night which is when you kissed me. Or you could count from the first time I told you I loved you.”

  “Um, that would be yesterday,” I reminded him.

  He shook his head. “That would be a few weeks ago. I was drunk, but I remember looking at you and thinking you were the most beautiful girl I’d ever known, so I told you how I felt. Of course, you weren’t inside my head, so you had no clue where I was coming from, and you freaked out, so I had to pretend like I’d passed out, but yeah, that was the first time.”

  I’m pretty sure my eyebrows hit my hairline with that disclosure. “So you did remember what happened. You told me you didn’t mean what you said that night, that you were drunk.”

  He cocked his head to the side.

  “You lied to me?” I deduced.

  He raised his index finger to correct me. “I do believe I artfully avoided answering your question, because I couldn’t believe my drunk ass told you I loved you after I slobbered all over you, but it was completely true.”

  I smiled up at him, my heart swelling as I saw the sincerity in his eyes. “It really was the worst kiss ever.”

  He leaned down and gently pressed his lips to mine, moving our mouths in tandem, as he slowly touched hi
s tongue to mine and massaged it gently. When he pulled back, he left me breathless.

  “Best kiss ever,” I whispered before diving back in for another.

  Chapter 18

  “Aww! That is so adorable!” Allison shrieked when she walked upstairs almost two weeks later.

  “Uh,” I groaned, burying my face in Josh’s chest. We were attempting to sleep in, but apparently Allison and her loud mouth weren’t going to allow that. “Make her go away.”

  “Go away, Al,” Josh grumbled, as he turned and pulled me against him so my back was to his front. He kissed the back of my head. “We’re sleeping.”

  “In the same bed,” she said, and I felt her weight depress the mattress.

  “That’s what people do when they’re dating,” I mumbled.

  “And naked,” Josh chimed in, and Allison was up off the bed in two seconds.

  “Eww, gross.”

  “Yeah, well maybe you should think twice before entering other people’s bedrooms without knocking.”

  “The door was open.”

  “Because no one else was here. If we want to run around naked and have sex in every room of the house, we’ll do it. Now get your stuff and get out, so we can have some peace.”

  Allison made a whimpering noise as her jaw dropped. I elbowed Josh in the ribs to let him know he’d taken things too far. He grunted in response, but didn’t say anything, so I did it again.

  “I’ll be in my room,” Allison said before she stomped off in a huff, slamming the bedroom door behind her.

  “What is the big idea?!” Josh demanded.

  Man, he was grumpy in the morning.

  I turned to face him. “It’s moving day, and Al is obviously upset. Be nice to her.”

  “Why is she upset?” He looked extremely confused.

  “Because she’s moving out. We’ve been roommates for eleven years. It’s the end of an era.”

  He looked even more confused. “She has ‘lived here’ in the loosest sense of the term for the past six months. I’m not even sure what she has to move out since she’s pretty much taken everything to Corey’s already.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You’re a guy. You wouldn’t understand, but today’s a sad day – for both of us. Just, please apologize to her and try to be nice.”

  Josh looked at me like what I was asking caused him physical pain. “Fine, whatever.”

  “I’m getting up, okay,” I told him.

  His arms grabbed me and pulled me tightly against him. “Would you be sad if I moved out?”

  I paused and searched his eyes for the hidden meaning. I’d been wondering when he was going to bring up our living situation now that we were together. I knew co-habitation freaked him out, so I was sure he was going to suggest an alternative option. Maybe down the road we could live together again.

  I nodded, trying to mask my emotions but be honest at the same time. He leaned forward and kissed my nose.

  “Is this your way of telling me you’re going to start looking for an apartment?”

  He reeled back in surprise. “What? No. Why would you think that?”

  I took a deep breath and explained my reasoning.

  He shook his head. “Tay, I was just joking. I told you the other day that I was serious about us, and I meant it. Unless you’re freaked out by the fact that we’re starting a relationship and living together, I don’t really want to change things. Do you?”

  I leaned forward and kissed the bare skin of his chest. It felt like a giant weight had been lifted from my shoulders. “No, I don’t.”

  “Okay. Then it’s settled,” he said, and deftly rolled on top of me. He kissed me once, and I felt his erection growing against my thigh. “What do you think the chances are of me getting some this morning?”

  I started to answer him that his chances were very good, but a loud noise from Allison’s room forced us both to look toward the closed door. We heard Corey say something to her and she snapped at him.

  I looked back at Josh. “Raincheck?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, I’ll go talk to her.”

  For as tough as Allison came across, she was also equally sensitive, and we both knew it.

  * * *

  “Hey,” Josh said into his cell phone, plugging his ear with his finger so he could hear better.

  I looked over at him, wondering who could be calling or better yet, why he was even answering his phone. We were at dinner with Allison and Corey – a little thank you to us for spending the day helping move them into the new house they were renting together.

  Josh didn’t usually answer his phone when we were out unless it was something important, but maybe it was Brad and there was an issue at the bar. I watched him intently as he listened, and then his face drained of all color.

  “What?!” he growled, and his whole body went rigid.

  I had immediate visions that the place was on fire or we’d been robbed or a fight had broken out and someone had gotten killed. My mind was racing as every crazy scenario that I imagined could happen in a bar was going down in the place I’d just purchased. Good thing we had insurance.

  I noticed around the table that all eyes were on Josh. I looked at Allison in question, and she just shrugged.

  “Okay. I know. Just stay calm. I’ll be there as soon as I can.” He ended his call and blinked a few times as if he needed to get his bearings.

  “Josh?” I questioned, not sure what was going on.

  He looked up at me for a split second, blinked a few more times, and shook his head as if trying to wrap it around something.

  I put my hand on his arm in an effort to calm him down.

  He looked up at me in surprise, almost as if he hadn’t expected to see me there, and I wasn’t sure what was going on. I was starting to freak out a little.

  “I-I have to go,” he finally stuttered, as he glanced around anxiously at Allison and Corey.

  “You okay, man?” Corey asked, but Josh ignored him.

  He just pulled out his wallet, threw enough money on the table to cover our drinks and headed for the door. I jumped out of my chair and ran after him.

  When I caught up to him on the sidewalk, I put my hand on his shoulder, and he jumped a mile.

  “J, what is going on?”

  He ignored me and threw his hand up to a passing cab. The cabbie saw him and swerved over to curb. Josh put his hand on the door handle, yanked it open and got into the backseat, so I followed him.

  “Airport,” Josh shouted to the cabbie, and the guy abruptly pulled away from the curb, slamming me against the backseat.

  Airport? What the hell was going on?

  I reached over to Josh to gain some support, my hands encircling his bicep. He looked at me in bewilderment, and it took his eyes a few seconds to focus. “Taylor, what are you doing?”

  I looked at him in confusion. “What do you mean, what am I doing? Josh, what the hell is going on? Why are you going to the airport?”

  He shook his head. “I have to take care of something. Something happened.”

  “What do you mean? What happened?”

  At least it wasn’t something with the bar.

  He took a deep breath and shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t know. Shit,” he said, as his head dropped into his hands.

  “Josh, where are you going?”

  He raised his head and looked out the window for a second before leaning forward toward the driver. “Can you go any faster?”

  “Only a little bit. I don’t want to get a ticket,” the cabby answered in accented English.

  “Josh!” I said, louder this time because he still hadn’t answered me.

  He was punching things into his cell phone at a rapid-fire pace. I could see he was on an airline website.

  “Joshua Nolan!” I practically screamed.

  His head snapped up. “Atlanta. I have to go to Atlanta.”

  So he had heard me. He was just ignoring me. Great.

  In my bag, my phone was beeping
like crazy, and I knew it was Allison. She was as concerned as I was, but I couldn’t answer her just then.

  “What is in Atlanta? That’s the third time you’ve been there this summer.”

  “I have to take care of something, okay?”

  “Is it Carlie?” I demanded, and he didn’t answer me. “Josh, why are you keeping secrets?”

  Dread filled my gut. I could feel the tiniest of pinpricks along the back of my eyes, and I wondered how I could go from being someone he couldn’t get enough of to, basically, an afterthought since had I not followed him into the cab, he would have left me at the restaurant.

  And then it was like he suddenly realized how he was acting. I don’t know if he saw the fear or the concern that was written all over my face or if he realized I was about to cry, but he reached out and pulled me into his arms. He took a few steadying breaths, and I knew he was trying to keep it together.

  “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry,” he said, as his lips met my forehead. “I can’t go into the details, but Carlie’s in a lot of trouble, and I need to get there. I have to help. It’s not good.”

  “When will you be back?”

  He sighed. “I don’t know. A few days, hopefully.”

  We made it to the airport in record time, and Josh moved to get out of the cab as soon as it stopped, releasing me in the process. I watched him, wondering how everything that had been so perfect was suddenly falling on its head, and I didn’t have the faintest idea why. But I knew it had nothing to do with me, and that at least brought me some sort of comfort.

  He swallowed hard and seemed to compose himself. “I love you,” he said, straining to sound normal. He sounded anything but. “I’ll pay the driver enough for you to get back home or back to the restaurant.”

  “Will you call me?”

  “I’ll try.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  He shook his head. “No. Thank you, though.”

  Then he leaned forward and kissed me, and it was the strangest, most gratifying, confusing kiss I’d ever received. And it was over far too soon. Josh was out of the cab before I could even open my eyes. When I did, he was walking away from me and into the terminal of the airport.