Just You

by Jane Lark

  ‘Okay.’ God, I couldn’t believe how much lighter the pressure on my shoulders was, or how much my heart lifted, when I had no business giving a shit whether Justin came over or not. But I was twenty-two today. I deserved some company.

  He arrived almost an hour dead from our last text, and even though I was expecting him, when the buzzer rang, telling me he was down at the front door. I jumped and then my stomach quivered with anxiety. God, this was madness. But it was Justin’s company or no-one’s, and no-one’s was a far worse choice.

  I had no idea where he’d come from–where he lived.

  My fingers were stupidly shaking as I pressed the intercom. “Hi.”

  “It’s Justin.”

  I pressed the button to free the door. “Come on up, I’m in the attic flat.”

  Shit I didn’t even know if he knew that. Maybe he knew that? Maybe I’d let him up here New Year’s Eve.

  My heart was going mad, I was so nervous; it pumped away with the pace of one of those crazy house music baselines like it was going to leap right out of my chest any moment. I twisted the lock and went out. I’d rather be in control of this–this time.

  On the landing, which was decorated in a modern eclectic style of peeling paint and mold, I leaned over the banister, looking down. “Justin!” He was on about the third flight of stairs. He stopped and looked up.

  “Portia! What’s up?”

  I smiled. God, it felt so good to have someone here, I was such a sad case. My fingers gripped the wooden rail as he looked away and started jogging up the stairs again. I’d worked with him for a year, I’d never considered him anything other than a work colleague before a few days ago, but now my eyes seemed to be seeing something else.

  He didn’t look any different though. His hair was cut dead short so he could hardly style it a new way, and he always had such a relaxed manner at work, he wasn’t going to be suddenly more laid back. Justin was Justin. But I liked what I saw. I mean, he didn’t have the obvious looks his friend Jason had had but he wasn’t at all bad looking and as he rounded the corner of the flight of stairs that would bring him up to my landing, his brown gaze caught mine. The guy had really nice eyes, like light shining through a glass of cola. He was kind of close to a young Will Smith when he smiled and definitely Jason Derulo standards when he didn’t.

  I straightened up, smiling too. “Hey.”

  “Hey. So this is your space then?”

  He hadn’t been up here. That was good to know. “Yep. Come in.” He was carrying a shopping bag. I turned and went back inside. He held the bag out when he came in.

  ~

  “This is for you.” I held out the stuff I’d got in a store along the street, offering it to Portia. Arriving empty handed would have been lame. “There’s M&Ms, vodka, cola and popcorn. All we need for a few hours of Netflix.”

  She looked uncertain but she took the bag from my hand and checked inside it.

  She was different outside the office. Her hair was down, and she was only wearing a vest top and a pair of skinny jeans which clung like a second skin. She looked like a different girl, a girl who might actually play a game of tonsil hockey in a pool with a guy about thirty steps below her on the social scale.

  I knew she came from money but shit, you wouldn’t know it from the place she lived in, and as she unpacked the stuff from the bag and put it onto the tiny square of space she had beside the two plate cooker, I glanced about her room. It was just a room, with a single bed, cooker and TV all-in. I’d researched her family in a bored moment when she started at the magazine and I knew her parents were loaded.

  I didn’t say anything as she tossed the packet of M&Ms and toffee popcorn on her bed. Then she looked up at me with those blue eyes that always seemed to judge people. “Thanks for coming over.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  She made a face at me, a cute face, her nose wrinkling, I’d never seen her wrinkle her nose, or look cute, ever. Sexy? Always…

  “Shall I put a film on now then?”

  “If you want, unless you want to change plans and go out somewhere?”

  “No, I’m happy to watch films, if you are? It’s my favorite thing, getting lost in films.”

  When I’d got her text asking me over here, I’d been at the table with Mom and the others. We’d just finished lunch. Mom had seen my face. I think my expression had probably said: What the fuck?

  “I’m bored.” What the hell had that meant? My mind had run through the fuck-buddy idea in my head. I mean, I’m young and I’m a guy. And after the party, there was reason to hope keeping her company might come with benefits.

  Mom had fired questions at me as I’d left the flat. But I was twenty-two. I didn’t want to be entirely tied to her. There had to be some get-out time in my life.

  “Why don’t you sit down?” Portia asked, throwing a look over her shoulder at the bed as she turned away from me.

  It was kind of intimate sitting on her bed. Maybe this seriously was a fuck-buddy thing, not just my wishful thinking.

  I perched on the edge, my hands clasping together as my elbows rested on my parted thighs and I tried to keep a firm hold on my imagination–and my libido.

  “You can take your coat off. You’re staying aren’t you?”

  She was laughing at me internally; it was in the movement at the corner of her pretty pouting lips and it caught in the blue in her eyes and made it brighter. I smiled at her, giving her a look that told her not to tease me but I stood again to take off my coat and hung it from a hook on the back of her door.

  It must be weird, just having a bedroom to live in. It was about the same size as mine although I did share my room with Robin. But at least I had a living room to walk into and a couch to sit on. She just had a bed and on the other side of the room, a cupboard work top and sink.

  She poured the vodka into glasses and then added the cola and held one out for me to take as I sat again. “Do you think it’s too early for this?”

  For a minute, I thought she meant me being ‘round here when we’d only just started something, but then I realized she was referring to the drink… And besides, we hadn’t really started anything. As I’d told her before–we’d just messed around in a pool at a party.

  “At two? Nope.”

  She put her drink on a chest beside the bed and picked up the laptop. I watched her face as she opened it.

  She glanced at me. “What do you want to watch?”

  Her gaze was definitely more blue than gray today. Maybe cause she had a blue vest top on. I shrugged. “You can have what you want. I’ll even suffer the Notebook or the Break up; your call.”

  She smiled. Beauty literally shone out of the girl when she smiled like that. I don’t think I’d ever seen her smile that openly at work. She always looked sly when she smiled at work, like she was being coy when she was anything but. “You’re saved, I hate romantic stuff. What about a Final Destination marathon, we’ll start at number one.”

  I grinned at her. “You’re on.” This was weird. I was sitting in Portia’s room, by her invitation, talking about watching horror movies. Had I slipped into a parallel universe? She wasn’t only thirty steps above me on the society ladder. She was about the same in looks–a whole mile out of my league. I’d pitch myself at eight, maybe scraping nine, but she was a full on ten.

  She went back to concentrating on setting the film up. My gaze dropped to her chest, the vest top she was wearing clung, tucking beneath her breasts. I could remember the feel of her breasts in my fingers. They’d looked pretty awesome in a bikini, the perfect fit for the heel of my palm to press them up, so my thumb could rub her nipple.

  Beneath her vest top, I could tell she had one of those thin cotton bras on. It meant the shape of her nipples pushed through the cloth.

  I shifted a little, moving out of her way so she could sit down, trying to distract my brain from the threat of a hard on. It definitely seemed, so far, that the undertone of ‘I’m bored’ had not
been a bootie call.

  She put the laptop up on the side as the film started playing and sat down on the bed, slipped her shoes off and curled her legs up as she slid to the back of the bed, then leaned against the wall. Her body was illuminated by a beam of sunlight which suddenly pierced the cloudy day and shone down through the skylight above us.

  The sunlight disappeared.

  She reached forward for her glass.

  I watched the opening scenes, feeling awkward again, like I didn’t know where to put myself with her so close.

  I didn’t get why she was here though, I don’t mean why she’d asked me, but why the rundown bedsit? Her parents were rich.

  I sipped my drink as she sipped hers.

  “Err! This is so violent!” her nose screwed up. It had a perfect tilt to its tip. How could the girl look so sexy with her nose screwed up? She did.

  “You picked it.” My tone came out flat as I fought an urge to kiss her. It had been her who’d kissed me in the pool.

  Her gaze spun to me, and a smile broke those perfect pink lips. She hadn’t an ounce of make up on today.

  “I don’t dislike the violence and gore, it’s just like OMG when it happens.”

  I smiled and shook my head at her, then threw the M&Ms over. “Open them.”

  Still smiling she did and took a handful for herself then passed them back to me. “You can take your boots off and sit on the bed properly with me…”

  Shit, something lurched in my gut and gripped at my cock.

  I leaned forward and unlaced my boots, then moved back on the bed with my knees bent up and my thighs parted while I rested my head against the wall. My forearm leaned on my bent knee as I still gripped my glass.

  We watched the movie in silence eating M&Ms.

  When actor number four met a vicious end, her cell started vibrating on the side by the laptop, ringing out Counting Stars. She picked it up and looked at the screen but didn’t answer, her whole body hesitating as she took a breath. Then her thumb touched it to take the call.

  “Hi Dad.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Working.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay.”

  “Say, hi, to Mom.”

  “Yes.”

  “Goodbye.”

  Her pitch had changed when she was on the cell. It got more posh, and British. Her dad was British. I knew that too.

  She colored up a bit as she leaned over and put her cell back on the side, saying nothing.

  God, I had to ask. “Portia, your parents are rich, right? Why the hell are you working at the magazine and living here?” My free arm thrust out to highlight the inadequacy of the shithole she was in.

  She went an even brighter red when she looked at me. Sirens blared on the film to mark another victim’s death. Taken down.

  “The money’s my parents, it’s not mine.”

  Well, yeah, but I’d have thought they’d have sorted her out somehow so she lived a bit better than this. If I had money, I’d want to help my family. Our gazes held for a moment, but then she looked back at the film and her lip caught in her teeth for a second.

  “You, okay?”

  She nodded but she wasn’t.

  “What did he say?”

  She turned back and smiled at me. “Happy Birthday.”

  I was moving forward without thinking, and I gripped her arm. “It’s your birthday? Why didn’t you say? I’d have got you something. No wonder you were bored alone. We should do something. Go out…”

  “I want to watch films.” That pretty pout was back.

  “I could have bought you cake.”

  “You didn’t have to buy cake and you did get me something, you got M&Ms, popcorn and vodka.”

  I ignored that. She was just changing the subject. “Are you seeing them?”

  “No, they’re in Switzerland.”

  “Really? Were they here for New Year?”

  “No.”

  “You didn’t see them the whole of the holidays?”

  “Nope, nor Thanksgiving. I see them in the summer when they come over to LA.”

  “In the summer?”

  She looked at me with a flat gaze that said, so. It wasn’t abnormal for her.

  If this was a rich kid’s life, I was glad all those wishes I’d made on birthday candles as a boy hadn’t come true. “What about when you were a girl?”

  “I was in boarding school, I stayed there.”

  Her expression said she didn’t care. But she’d grown up on her own. A frown crushed my brow–I’d got her wrong in the office. But now she did look like the girl I’d worked with for a year. Her lips had pouted and her chin was up, in that aggressive bitch like expression I knew well.

  “How much did you see them?” My hand ran over my hair, back and forth, as I said it. I was still knee deep in shock.

  “A few weeks every year.”

  A few weeks? Well that had probably been as much as I’d seen Dad when he was meant to be with us, but that was because he didn’t give a shit and was in and out of jail–what about her parents then….

  “That’s crazy.” The words slipped out of my mouth before I realized I’d said them aloud.

  Her gaze burned into mine, and then there was the girl I’d met today, the one who looked uncertain as she bit her lip an instant before saying. “Not in my world.”

  She moved to pick up the popcorn and focused on pulling it open then sat back and started slipping the burst kernels into her mouth.

  I smiled, pity probably leaking into my eyes. She didn’t look like she’d had a happy childhood. Maybe that’s why she was so arrogant–self-defense. Maybe that office expression of hers wasn’t aggressive but defensive?

  “Are you sure you don’t want to go out and do something, we could go to a bar, or–”

  Her gaze spun to me as sharp as a blade. “No I’m fine. I want to stay in.”

  Nope, she hadn’t been happy. She looked away, and I shut up and let her watch the film. She had her knees bent up in front of her now.

  “Do you want more vodka?”

  She nodded, so I got up and topped up her glass, not adding anymore cola. Then I filled mine.

  She didn’t say anything as I sat down next to her again, just gripped her ankles and watched the film play out to its violent conclusion.

  When it finished she looked at me for the first time since I’d topped up her drink. “Sorry, I’m shit company…”

  I didn’t know what to say. “Do you really want to watch these? You don’t have to watch horror for my benefit.”

  Her shoulders shivered like a draft caught her. “Believe me, I’m not into rom coms and happy endings; I like horror.”

  I always thought the two of us were entirely different but now… I felt sorry for her…

  “Put the next film on. Then come over here…”

  She didn’t say anything as she downloaded the film. But once she’d got it going and slid back onto the bed, I lifted my arm and she did come over, slotting under it and leaning against me. Her fingers rested on my stomach. My abs gripped tight in a sharp spasm.

  I liked her touching me. I’d liked her touching me in the pool. And it was nice having her tucked under my arm.

  Portia was pear shaped, wider hipped with a tiny waist, and really slender on top. She felt delicate against me but it was kind of awkward. “Tell you what, why don’t we top up our glasses and lie down and watch it?”

  She threw me a suspicious smile but nodded anyway and straightened up. She fetched the bottle and brought it over to half-fill my glass, then she topped up hers before coming back with cola. “Neat or mixed?”

  “Mixed.” I let her fill my glass up and put it on the bedside table within reach. Then I laid down closer to the wall so she could fit on the bed in front of me.

  I propped my head up on my palm as she tipped the rest of the M&Ms into a bowl. When she came over, she offered me som
e. I took a handful.

  Then she set the M&Ms down and tossed the cushions from the other end of the bed, my way. “Use them.”

  I stuffed a couple beneath my head, with the sweet taste of M&Ms flooding my mouth.

  She put her drink down next to mine, then lay in front of me, on her side, one palm tucked beneath her cheek as she carried on watching the film. I slipped my arm around her, my hand resting on her belly. Was it possible to call a girl’s belly pretty. She had a pretty belly, tight, and the cotton of her vest brushed over her skin.

  Interest stirred my cock. I focused on the film instead of her body. She didn’t want me prodding her in the back; the girl was in a down mood.

  “What are your parents like?” She asked.

  That question came out of nowhere. She was still looking at the laptop, watching the film. “Dad’s gone–”

  Her head turned so she could look up at me. “I’m sorry…”

  “No need to be. Mom threw him out. He was a douchebag, we’re better off without him.”

  “We?” Her blue eyes were still looking up at me.

  “I’ve got three brothers. Robin’s seventeen, Jake’s fourteen, and Dillon, the baby, he’s eight.”

  “That’s a lot of brothers.”

  “That’s a lot of trouble.” I grinned at her. “I’ve got the task of keeping them in line.”

  Her gaze changed, like it was looking inward, not outward, and she turned to watch the film.

  “Is your Mom, nice? That must be hard work?”

  “She’s nice, though she’s not above clipping us all around the ear once or twice and hounding me. But I respect her. She works, she keeps us all on track.”

  She nodded, still watching the film.

  “What about your parents, are they nice?”

  Her shoulder lifted in a shrug. “Yeah.”

  It didn’t sound like they smothered her with love. Gripping her shoulder, I rolled her onto her back and looked down at her.

  “They’re okay, really, I’m just in a blue mood.”

  I took a breath as my gaze dropped to her perfect pink lips. I looked back up. “I want to kiss you, Portia, can I kiss you?”

  Her answer was a nod, and I leaned down, my fingers sliding to her side. I could feel muscle beneath the cotton of her vest top, as my tongue dipped into the heat of her mouth. I pulled back after a couple of brushes of my lips over hers and looked into her eyes–the blue was brighter, shinier. She hadn’t just said, yes; she’d wanted me kiss to her.