The Hope That Starts

by Heidi Hutchinson

  “Someone finally caught a reference. Awesome,” Zelda laughed nervously. At this point she just wanted to get away. She wanted to get back to her room and shower and eat her cookie and beat her hair into submission. Small victories, that's all she wanted.

  Harrison's face was blank. Completely unreadable. Zelda smiled again before slipping away. She kept her eyes on the floor even after the elevator doors opened and she had to face the Starbucks before the doors closed on her.

  She didn't look at him.

  But she could feel his eyes on her the whole way until she was safely closed inside the lift.

  ***

  Lenny waited until Zelda was gone before she kicked Harrison's foot. He tore his eyes from the closed elevator doors and they connected with Lenny's assessing sapphire ones.

  “What the hell, Lenny?” he asked, grimacing.

  Her look showed no remorse. “I didn't say anything she wasn't already aware of.”

  Harrison gritted his teeth. Of course she already knew. Zelda was smart. Really smart. Too smart for him. Still he said, “You're a pain in my ass, you know that?”

  Lenny grinned and cut in front of him to order herself a coffee. She turned her body out, looking at Harrison. “Don't over-think it. If you like her, it'll happen.”

  “Simple as that, huh?” he asked.

  Lenny grabbed her coffee off of the counter and stepped aside. “Yeah. Trust me.” Her hand shot out and gripped his bicep, her eyes imploring. “Really. I know what I'm talking about. Just let it happen.”

  Harrison studied her while taking a deep breath, then he gave her a single nod. She flashed him a smile before letting him go and exiting the coffee shop.

  “What can I get started for you?” the friendly barista, who now knew more about his personal life than even his own mother, asked with a smile.

  Harrison looked over the menu board briefly. “How about a vanilla latte?” he asked.

  Because, for reasons he was annoyed with, he couldn't get the craving for vanilla out of his mind.

  ***

  The show in Denver went off without a hitch. The lights, the sound, the music, nothing was amiss.

  Zelda took her pictures, had her fun, and then went back to the bus. She was exhausted. The crash from the previous night's activities was hitting her hard. Weirdly, she was looking forward to getting back on the road.

  She just wanted to keep moving forward. Whatever this was she was feeling for Harrison was becoming a huge distraction. The majority of the pictures she was taking every night were of him. Except for that night she had been a little miffed at him and so her lens had focused on the rest of the band.

  He wanted to be friends with Kiley. Fine. She could be totally fine with that. That didn't mean she had to look at him.

  The sugar crash and exhaustion were very convenient excuses for why she went to bed so early. She knew she was really only taking an angry nap.

  She wasn't sure how long she'd been sleeping before irate voices woke her up. Her hands went to her face and rubbed aggressively as she tried to remember exactly where she was.

  The bus. Her bunk in the bus.

  Who was talking like an ass?

  “No, you listen to me! I don't want you contacting her ever again!” Harrison demanded in a voice Zelda had never heard before.

  She swung her legs out of the bed, ran down the short hallway, braced her hands on either side of the stairway, and propelled herself to the bottom.

  Harrison was standing in the center of the cabin, one hand on his hip, the other pressing Zelda's phone to his ear, his back to her. His bare back. Because of course he would be shirtless and angry upon her waking.

  Sway was sitting on the couch and shaking his head at him, probably trying to indicate that Zelda was present. Harrison turned to face her, his scowl so impressive he'd make Carl proud.

  “What are you doing?” Zelda asked, reaching for her phone. Harrison jerked his head away from her reach and placed his free hand on the center of her chest, holding her back.

  “You call this number again and we're gonna have problems,” he said, then he ended the call, pitching the phone into the cushions next to Sway. He turned the full might of his glower on Zelda. She shrank back reflexively. “Why in the hell is that piece of shit sending you pictures of his dick?!”

  Zelda sucked in a breath. She intended to answer his question rationally and logically. But her actions did not match her intentions.

  “What are you doing on my phone?” she snapped. She tried to stomp past him to get to it, but he seized her by her upper arm and held her still. She clenched her fists by her side and narrowed her eyes at him. “Let. Me. Go.”

  He did. Immediately. But she didn't move or look away. It was a standoff. A powder keg of seriously confusing emotions, where the wrong word had the potential to set either of them off.

  “What are you doing snooping in my phone?” she asked through clenched teeth.

  “I wasn't snooping,” he argued. “You left it on the table.”

  “So that gives you the right to read my personal messages?” she shot back.

  Then Harrison blew.

  He swung an arm back to point at the phone. “That's sexual harassment, Zelda! If a guy is sending you pictures of his penis he should be reported to the authorities! How am I the bad guy?”

  Zelda didn't like that he was right, so she ignored it. “That's not the point, Harrison. It's my life, it's my phone! I was handling it!”

  “No, you weren't!” he bellowed.

  “So how did you handle it, huh?” she asked, unfazed by his ire. She crossed her arms over her chest and jutted out a hip. “Did you contact the authorities?”

  Harrison didn't think before he answered. He probably should have. “No.” He shook his head like that was a ludicrous thought. “I told him I was your boyfriend and if he contacted you again, I'd be paying him a visit.”

  Zelda felt her eyebrows disappear in her hairline. “No, Harrison!” she yelled. “You can't do that!”

  “Why not?” he shouted.

  “This is my life! You don't get to pretend to be the weird girl's boyfriend to make the skeezy ex go away and adorable hijinks ensue. This isn't a 90s teen movie! This is my real life!”

  Harrison's face went blank. The anger was still there, but significantly muted. He turned to Sway, who shrugged at him silently. Harrison's brown eyes came back to her and looked her up and down. She fought against the urge to shrink back.

  “I'm sorry,” he said, surprising the crap out her. She felt her mouth fall open a little. Harrison pressed his lips together and looked down at his feet. “I just... I really hate that guy.”

  Zelda huffed. “Me too.”

  He looked back up at her. They stared at each other for a long time. Too long.

  “Please don't put up with this guy's harassment,” he pleaded earnestly.

  Zelda swallowed and nodded her head. “Okay,” she agreed. “If it happens again, I'll file a complaint.”

  Relief washed over Harrison’s features and he reached out, grabbing the back of Zelda's head and pressing her to his chest. His other arm came around her and pinned her to his front—his still shirtless and impressively muscled front. Her hands braced on the outside of his biceps and she closed her eyes.

  “Why do you have to smell so good and feel so safe? I still want to be mad at you,” she said in exasperation into his chest. His deep chuckle vibrated through her whole body and she enjoyed that, too.

  “I'm just gonna go get something,” Sway mumbled, and Zelda felt him slip past them to go up to the bunks.

  They stood there for a long time. Zelda held him like she hadn't seen him in ages, and he returned it. They hadn't had a great couple of days and she missed him. She listened to the heavy thud of his heart in his chest and she didn't want to move. Ever.

  It was part relief, part hope, and part confusion that had her clinging to him. She had no idea what was happening between them. She couldn't sep
arate what she was fantasizing and what was real. But hugging seemed like a very viable intermediate.

  She felt his hands on the side of her face as he gently turned her face up to his. His eyes were warm but inscrutable. He scanned her face slowly, his tongue darting out to wet his bottom lip. Zelda stared at it.

  His thumb glided over her lips and she parted them in response.

  His head slanted and she fought to keep her eyes open. She didn't want to mistake this moment. She wanted to see it coming.

  But then his lips made contact and her eyes closed on their own. His mouth was hot on hers, his tongue gliding in between her lips and persuading her mouth to open more fully to him. Then it was back to lips only. He kissed her bottom lip, then her top one. Slowly, tenderly. His tongue returned for a sweep, then disappeared again. Zelda's mouth felt fluid, pliable, completely at his mercy. His gentle, torturous mercy.

  Hot breath hit her jaw before lips followed. A small sigh escaped her and he kissed a searing path down her neck to her pulse point.

  One of his hands pressed into her lower back, keeping her anchored to him. The other hand tilted her head so he could explore her neck further. Slowly, painfully, he worked his way back to her mouth. His lips gentle, pillowy soft, kneading hers. Then his tongue glided in for another thrilling taste.

  Harrison rested his forehead to hers, his eyes closed. Zelda watched him through hazy, half-lidded eyes. He licked his lips as if savoring the taste of her still.

  “That was better than I had imagined it was going to be,” he whispered. “And I imagined it was going to be pretty spectacular.”

  Lightning shot through her belly, but all she could do was smile in response.

  His brown eyes opened and he leaned back a little to look at her. “Lightsaber eyes, they cut right through me.”

  Zelda bit back a sigh. She wanted to swoon, right there in his arms. Would that be okay?

  Something changed on his face. His brown eyes shuttered and he closed her out again. It happened so fast, she had no time to react or process or question what happened next.

  He gave her a lopsided smile and then touched her nose with a fingertip after he had stepped back, separating them. “Goodnight, kiddo.”

  Moving around her, he went up the steps to the bunks, leaving her alone in the quiet cabin.

  Okay, what?

  She knew she hadn't imagined what had just happened.

  Had she?

  No, that was real.

  That was epically real.

  So what in Galadriel's Mirror had just happened?

  Boys were sooo stupid.

  Chapter 13

  Give Me Love

  “You guys, just let it go,” Zelda said, sticking her finger in the whipped topping of her white chocolate mocha. “It's not that big of a deal.”

  She was lying of course, but sometimes lying had to happen.

  Especially when your new girlfriends were hell-bent on stringing up the guy you were totally in love with.

  “Why do you do that?” Lucy asked, exasperated. She sat back suddenly, her chair slightly scooting with her momentum.

  “Do what?” Zelda feigned innocence.

  “Pretend like you're the weird one,” Lucy said pointedly.

  Zelda snorted. “I am the weird one.”

  Lenny shook her head and leaned onto her elbows on the table. “No, you act like you're the one who's made the mistake and you absolve the other person of any responsibility.”

  Zelda shrugged and looked out the window of the coffee shop. “I take things too far. I make them bigger in my head than they really are.”

  It had been a week since The Kiss. The event that had rocked her to her foundations, left her dizzy, confused, and excited. A week since she'd been alone in a room with Harrison. Because after that, he'd done everything he could to avoid her entirely. Even going so far as to literally run away from her when Sway had left the bus early this morning.

  She'd come down the stairs to find him tying his shoes. She didn't even have a chance to say hello. He was sprinting down the steps so hastily he tripped and fell, sprawling ingloriously onto the gravel at the bottom of the steps. He scrambled to his feet and ran across the parking lot.

  Like she was the monster in a bad B-movie.

  Zelda turned her eyes back to her friends. “I made more out of it than I should have. He's not into me and he's telling me in the nicest way possible.”

  Lucy looked like she was about ready to catch fire. Her reputation for being feisty was making a lot of sense. “But he kissed you. And then he told you it was better than he had imagined it would be.”

  Zelda was almost regretting telling them about what had happened. But she had to talk about it with someone; it was definitely the best kiss of her life. It needed to be talked about at the very least.

  “Well, he obviously changed his mind,” Zelda said.

  Lenny frowned and chewed on the inside of her cheek. “Let me talk to him.”

  Zelda shook her head. “No. Really, guys. Just let it go. It was a mistake and he regrets it. We still have a couple months left on this tour, I really don't want to make it awkward or uncomfortable.”

  “Then he should have thought about that before he made us all believe that he was into you,” Lucy snapped, maintaining only a very loose hold on her anger.

  Zelda needed to diffuse this. She sat up and gave them an apologetic smile. “It's really okay. I've made a habit of chasing boys, I really need to stop.” They both looked ready to interrupt, so she held up a hand. “Guys, he actually ran away. The man is thirty years old. I'm not into playing games and I'm not into being someone's mama. If he wants to have a grown-up relationship, he's going to have to act like a grown-up.”

  Lucy pursed her lips and Lenny nodded in understanding.

  “Let's just let this go and have a good rest of a tour, okay?” Zelda asked, ignoring the burning in the back of her eyes. She'd had boys run away from her in the past, not since eighth grade, but still. This one hurt like hell, though.

  “He's such an idiot,” Lucy grumbled.

  Lenny didn't say anything, she just looked down at her coffee. Zelda couldn't help but think she was going to end up missing out on something amazing. She had let herself get attached to these women, hoping that someday their friendship would take on a more permanent status.

  Now, the most she could hope for was remaining friends. As long as she didn't let this thing with Harrison get weirder, she would be able to remain a part of the band in a professional and friendly capacity.

  At least she had that.

  ***

  “What in the actual hell did you do to yourself?” Kendra growled as she dabbed alcohol on the palms of Harrison’s hands.

  “He was running like a little bitch and fell down,” Sway answered for him, disgusted.

  Kendra's eyes shot up to Harrison’s face, which had turned a dark red.

  “Is that true?” she asked.

  Harrison’s jaw worked back and forth but he didn't answer.

  “You realize that playing tonight is going to be incredibly difficult,” she said pointedly.

  Harrison sighed and rolled his eyes. “Yes, just finish already, would ya?”

  Kendra glanced at Sway briefly before going back to her task. She had an idea of what this was about. What was surprising was Sway's obvious irritation with it. Maybe it wasn't that surprising. Sway tended to expect his friends to make better choices.

  “Okay,” she said, standing up. “That's the best I can do. Keep them clean.”

  Harrison stood up and shoved past both of them and out of the crew bus. Kendra looked at Sway.

  “He kissed her a week ago and has been bolting from her ever since,” Sway supplied without being asked.

  Kendra's heart squeezed. She shook her head and didn't say anything.

  “Don't worry,” Sway said with a smirk. “I got this.”

  ***

  Harrison opened his hands and then clenched t
hem again, grimacing with the stretch of the healing scrapes he'd sustained three days ago.

  The last thing Harrison needed was a day off with nothing to do. Tour hard for ten days, take a day off. He'd written the damn schedule himself. It was the best way to get the most dates in without completely burning out. Then they could take eight to twelve months off.

  They'd parked in Salt Lake City and checked into the hotel and he locked himself in his room. Nothing on television and there was no way he was going to go downstairs. He'd been dodging Zelda for ten days and now he finally had a locked door and ten floors between them.

  So why did it still feel like he couldn't breathe?

  Adding to his misery was Zelda behaving as if nothing had changed between them.

  At least after the first day.

  The day immediately following him kissing her, she'd tried to talk to him.

  Harrison had panicked. And he hadn't stopped. Even after Zelda made it clear she wasn't asking for anything. In fact, that seemed to frustrate him even more. She went about her day-to-day like it was all the same to her. She treated him exactly as she always had. Even making sandwiches for him and Sway every single day.

  Meanwhile, Harrison couldn't sleep, couldn't eat, couldn't get the sight of those heated green eyes out of his head or the taste of her out his mouth. He smelled cookies wherever he went, he felt Sway's glare every time he walked into the room.

  He stopped and looked around at the vacant suite. He'd been pacing for a good thirty minutes after giving up on taking a nap. Maybe he needed something to eat. Something salty, maybe spicy. Something to get the overly sweet residue out of his mouth.

  He tucked his cell and the room key into his back pocket.

  The hotel had a grill-bistro thing off of the lobby and he headed there. He asked to be seated in a booth near the back where he ordered a steak and a beer. Then he sat there for two hours.

  The steak was tough. The beer was flat.

  Life was seriously awful at the moment.

  “They have whole pints? Maybe I should get one.”

  Harrison's eyes focused slowly on the wild hair and green eyes that had slid into the booth across from him. Zelda's wonky smile caught him off-guard and he felt himself return the smile. She motioned to the server, who came over and took her drink order.