These Battered Hands

by Laurel Ulen Curtis

She was still turned on and tuned up on adrenaline, and apparently, lust made her frolicsome.

  Fuck me.

  I didn’t know if she always reacted this way or if it was the intensity and unexpected nature of the moment, but I had absolutely no desire to waste it. I wanted to get her somewhere else, somewhere where I could work her back up to that reaction again, and I wanted to do it quickly.

  I grabbed her hand and ran, pulling her behind me into the more brutal rain of the open parking lot. Her hand clenched tightly in mine when a gust of wind drove the rain like horizontal spikes.

  The pound of her bare feet on the pavement behind me sounded like a rhythm, each step jolting through my chest and confirming the unbelievable fact that we were here. That she had followed me from the gym, that she’d been the one to kiss me.

  All of it felt like an imaginary whirlwind. Her car only feet away, I dropped her hand in preparation and rounded the hood, hoping to everything holy that she kept her keys in the car rather than her bag in the gym. If not, we’d have to take the motorcycle, and besides the rain, I didn’t like the idea of her riding with so much unprotected skin exposed.

  “Keys?” I called over the hood, just as she opened the passenger door.

  She nodded with knowing, pointing inside the car and sinking into the seat and out of the rain.

  I yanked my door open and threw one leg in, but looked up as I did.

  Right into the eyes of Frank Nickleson.

  Hands on his hips, he stood stagnant on the other side of the glass door, keen and curious eyes on me and the very familiar car I was waiting to sink into.

  Panic very nearly jolted my body—for Callie rather than myself—but I fought it, instead giving him a resolute, confident nod with an open ended meaning.

  He could contemplate his own clues, paint his own picture, and draw his own conclusions.

  But I’d planted a seed of doubt with one simple gesture.

  Guilty men, fraught with wrongdoing and wicked intentions, rarely looked their jury directly in the eye.

  And after trusting me to guide his daughter professionally, no matter the age of consent and lack of dissent between hers and my own, Frank Nickleson would very much see me as a guilty man if he knew the details of my intentions for my relationship with her.

  As I slid into the car, desperate to hold on to the fun, free-loving woman unlocked by a kiss, I decided not to tell Callie about her father’s watchful eye. Not if she hadn’t noticed it on her own.

  Mischief and happiness sparkled in her eyes as she turned to me. “Where are we going?”

  “My apartment,” I decided and decreed at once, wanting the privacy and freedom to talk to her how I wanted, touch her how I wanted, and open up the next chapter of her beautifully written book.

  All of the things she’d kept locked away for the last few weeks lingered on the surface, and I was eager to scrape as many of them up as I could before they disappeared.

  A shiver ran through her body as she opened the console between us, grabbed the keys from inside, and handed them to me with an electric brush of her hand.

  “Cold?” I asked as I started the engine, ignoring the man that still stood in front of us and focusing on her.

  “A little,” she admitted, turning on the heat and pointing the vent until air directly bathed her skin.

  I wanted to pull her into my arms, warm her with the heat of my own body and the comfort of my arms, but I knew it wasn’t a good idea.

  “I’m sorry. It won’t take long to get there,” I said instead, watching as her brows scrunched slightly together before turning away and putting the car into gear.

  Hurt feelings and unmet expectations would have to wait.

  I turned left out of the parking lot and drove toward the center of town. Past the McDonald’s where we’d shared greasy chicken nuggets, a Quarter Pounder, and nervously aggressive conversation, through Main Street, and to the apartment complex on the other side that housed my home.

  I missed the home I shared with my parents throughout my childhood, but not because of the house. I missed the laughter of my mother and the playful antics by my father that caused it. I missed the loving acceptance they provided me through all of my decisions, the support they gave to my athletic career, and their ability to balance that with a life devoid of pressure.

  I didn’t think Callie had that—an unconditional support system.

  I wanted to be that for her.

  As I pulled into the spot directly in front of my unit, Callie’s voice cracked with nerves. The fog of lust and passion had worn off, and reality had set in. “What are we doing, Nik?”

  I turned to her fully, put a hand to her jaw, and leaned in until my lips just barely touched hers. She didn’t pull back or protest, but the pulse in her neck throbbed violently.

  “What we’ve wanted to do since the first night we met.” When the words were finished, the movement fully formed against her lips, I added pressure, settling my mouth against hers and sealing the statement with a kiss.

  She kissed me back slowly, the taste of cinnamon and heat working its way into my mouth along with her tongue as she gave into the moment and allowed herself the freedom from her mind.

  I never wanted it to end, but I also wanted more than stolen kisses and unsure rendezvous.

  And that kind of more was only founded on more. More communication, more understanding, and more respect.

  Breaking the kiss slowly, I let my hand linger on her cheek, feeling it heat with both embarrassment and something else as her eyes met mine.

  “Let’s go inside, okay?” I asked softly.

  “Yeah,” she agreed with a nod, staring into my eyes for a beat longer and then turning to open her door. I followed suit, rounding the hood and walking beside her to ensure she didn’t step on something that would hurt either of her bare feet.

  My bag inconveniently still in my bike at the gym, I reached around the side of my door, behind the bush and pulled the hidden key out of its box before shoving it in the lock and opening the door.

  With an extended arm, I suggested she go first, flipping on the switch for the light in the hall as I stepped in behind her.

  “Just down and to your right,” I suggested, guiding her to the living room.

  When she got to the opening, she hesitated.

  Her eyes found mine as she asked, “Do you think I could take a quick shower? I’m sticky from the chalk and the rain kind of—”

  “Of course.” I cut her off before hearing the rest. It didn’t matter why, other than meaning it needed rectifying.

  “Come on,” I said. My hand fit directly in the slight hollow of her lower back, and her steps, though her legs were much shorter than mine, matched me beat for beat.

  I reached around the wall in order to flick on the light switch in the bathroom, pushing the door out of the way and standing back to let her enter. “There are towels under the sink, shampoo and stuff in the shower. Sorry if it smells like guy, but—” I hollowed my cheeks in jest, “that’s kind of how I like to smell.”

  She smiled slightly and stepped into the space, but as I turned to leave she stopped me with a hand to my shoulder.

  “Is this how it’s gonna be from now on?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “I don’t know. Awkward. Overly nice. Tiptoeing around one another?” she offered.

  I only hid part of my smile. “For right now? Yeah, probably,” I admitted. “See, I’m a little skittish about running you off and you’re trying your best to convince me you can be something other than crabby.”

  “Hey!”

  I released the rest of my smile, letting it soar all the way to the tops of my cheeks and pull at the corners of my eyes.

  And then I winked. “Don’t worry, though. Something tells me it won’t last.”

  Her shoulders relaxed at the same pace as her face, draining her of tension and filling its void with understanding.

  She’d still give me a hard time,
and I was more than happy to give one back. There would never be a time when we didn’t yell, and no matter how right I was, she’d still fight me on admitting it.

  But we’d get to fool around a little.

  I, personally, felt like it couldn’t get much better than that.

  “Go shower,” I instructed. “I’ll get you some clothes to put on.”

  “Thanks,” she replied. Both of us knew she didn’t just mean for the clothes.

  My bedroom just down the hall, I got a pair of shorts, boxers, and a t-shirt out of my dresser fairly quickly and headed back for the bathroom.

  The water was on, but I knocked to make sure she was inside and not standing naked in the middle of the bathroom. It wasn’t that I didn’t want her to be that way or didn’t want to see it, but I had a feeling she felt everything I was feeling times a million.

  And to me, the whole day felt—

  Surreal.

  Before Nik had shown up a little over three weeks ago, I would have sworn up and down that unicorns shitting rainbows and giant cars made of candy were a more realistic possibility than me getting mixed up in some pseudo-forbidden romance with anyone, let alone my new coach.

  Add in the fact that I knew I’d have to face questions about my behavior that day at some point—I lived with my parents for shit’s sake—and my head was reeling.

  Spinning and spiraling to figure out the ups and the downs and how to make it all order itself into something that made sense. Something that fit in with the person I thought I was or proved irrefutably that I’d been wrong all along. I couldn’t settle on either scenario, my world stuck in the limbo in between. I’d never been in between two places before.

  At least, it didn’t seem like it. I knew I had been, the impossibility of getting from one place to the other without passing through the area in between crystal cut. But I usually made moves with precision, a straight line of least resistance and notably lacking in traffic.

  In some ways, I hadn’t traveled much at all, sticking to my comfort zone even if I pushed at my levels of adaptability within it. I’d never felt like I was truly losing something that I desperately wanted to gain.

  And that fact left me somewhat inexperienced emotionally in addition to physically.

  The smell of Nik’s shampoo had me nearly coming out of my skin as I massaged it into my hair, the memory of its scent lodged in my brain from the moment I’d put my eager searching hands into his hair. The wet from the rain revived the scent as we’d kissed, bleeding it into the air like a slow release valve for the air on your tires.

  A knock sounded on the door.

  “Yeah?”

  It cracked open slowly, a low-pitched squeal just barely emanating from poorly oiled hinges.

  “I’ll just leave the clothes here on the counter,” Nik said without preamble or waiting for a reply. The door shut behind him with a click, and my head followed it by sinking into my hands.

  I had to laugh to myself as I stood there under the warm water, bathed in the lingering awkwardness of his delivery.

  Nervousness seeped off of his normally confident figure in the way he moved and spoke and looked at me. He said all of the right words, plugged all of the right holes, and answered all of the right questions, but he felt just as lost as me.

  And the beauty of that was it made me feel a little less lost after all.

  It was a spin on the old, “Not all those who wander are lost.”

  For me, for us, I couldn’t help but feel that those who wander aimlessly together, aren’t, in fact, aimless at all.

  When the last of the shampoo rinsed from my hair and the last of the soap slipped from my body, I turned off the water and stepped out.

  His towel was fluffy and new, and its scent suggested a fresh wash.

  I’d noticed briefly on the way in that everything seemed tidy and thoughtfully placed too. I wasn’t sure if this was an insight into his personality or if he just hadn’t spent enough time here to mess it up, but I logged the information and stored it for later, just in case.

  His clothes were baggy, but not by too much, the muscle tone of his athletic body more lean that meaty.

  I finger combed the strands of my hair and left them loose, took one last look in the mirror and deep breath in my lungs, and stepped out into the quiet darkness of the hallway.

  The utter silence was disconcerting, but I figured with the riotous mess my nerves were, there could be a full blown concert taking place in his apartment and I still wouldn’t have felt completely at ease.

  A small beacon of light shone from the living room, so I padded along the dark, berber carpet to the opening he’d shown me before and peeked inside. I didn’t know quite what to expect from any of it. From him, from our intimate encounter, or if it would directly lead into more.

  I felt torn, both wanting to pick up where we left off and anxiously unready at the same time. When I’d stormed out of the gym, I’d been lost in myself and my mind and the lingering effects of him. Now, fresh from my shower, I’d scrubbed some of my boldness away, shining the surface to a cautiously inhibited clean.

  “Hey,” he greeted me immediately from his spot on the couch, dry clothes replacing his previously soaked ones.

  “Hey,” I waved back, unsure of where we were supposed to go from here.

  I felt comfortable in his apartment, as much as I could under the circumstances, and I trusted him not to push me, but my experience in all things adult was limited.

  I’d lived a very tunneled life, the traffic of my intentions flowing in one very distinct direction—Olympic greatness. That left little time for anything else, romantic or otherwise.

  Now that I wanted it, I didn’t know how to take it.

  “You look like a frightened puppy,” he called out, making my contemplative eyes jerk to his.

  Mine narrowed slightly in mildly affronted reaction. “You don’t look exactly at ease yourself,” I argued.

  Laughter rolled from deep in his chest, up the column of his throat, and out of his appealing mouth, letting out the breath we’d both been holding in one swift moment.

  “You’re right.”

  I walked over to him as he spoke and sat down on the couch across from him. His hand automatically sought mine, his fingers pushing through mine and settling into a hold that felt strangely like home.

  “Let’s break the ice,” he suggested. “We’ll each admit something embarrassing to each other. Something you haven’t told anyone else and have tried your best to forget yourself.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I grumbled, horrified. “That sounds like a great idea.”

  He laughed at my obvious sarcasm and squeezed my hand, pulling the pair of them until the back of his entwined hand rested on his thigh. I watched as it went but pried my eyes free when he spoke again.

  “It won’t be that bad. I’ll go first.” He took a deep breath and exhaled, but when I expected him to start his confession, he stalled a little more instead. “Just remember that this exercise is meant to endear me to you. If I find out you’re selling my secrets on the internet, I’ll be pissed.”

  “No selling your embarrassing tales on the internet. Got it.” He nodded, but I held up a finger to slow him. “Unless, I stand to gain a fortune weighty enough to sustain independent wealth.”

  One corner of his mouth hitched up.

  “If they’re willing to pay that much, I’ll probably tell,” I teased through a face scrunch and a shrug.

  “Deal,” he agreed good-naturedly, his whole being alight with humor and goodness.

  I’d never considered the kind of man I wanted enough to know what qualities that included ahead of time.

  The more I spent time with him, though, the more that list of non-existent qualities looked like him.

  Patient. Forgiving. Unflappably rational.

  Engaged in me and life and everything around him.

  He actually spoke with his eyes, crinkling the corners and narrowing them just enough to make me not
ice when he was choosing his words carefully. They widened infinitesimally when he was working harder to make me agree with his point or when he really wanted me to listen. And they were just as expressive when he was listening to me. They emoted his every feeling and absorbed each accompanying one of mine.

  I’d been noticing all along, but forcing myself to forget.

  I most certainly wasn’t forgetting right then.

  “Okay,” he said, getting himself ready to admit one of his best kept secrets. “Embarrassing. God, yeah, this fits the bill.” He paused again. “Who’s idea was this again?”

  I laughed. “Yours.”

  He nodded his resignation. “Right. Okay, so. I was fourteen, right?”

  “I imagine you were at one time, yes,” I goaded.

  He shook his head in amusement. “Well, you know what fourteen is like for guys—”

  I raised my brows.

  He chuckled and pushed his hair back out of his eyes in discomfort. “Okay, right, I guess you don’t.” He bit his bottom lip and considered his words carefully. “It’s a temperamental time for a young man—hormonally.”

  I couldn’t help the stupid smile from forming on my face and sticking, both corners of my mouth secured indefinitely to the corners of my eyes.

  “Jennifer Joffries was the hottest gymnast in my gym, all hips and overdeveloped breasts and long ass legs.”

  I narrowed my eyes and glanced down, my lack of boobs standing out like a neon sign between us.

  He shook his head, pushed more hair out of his face with his free hand.

  Where was his hat? Oh. Probably in his motorcycle. At the gym.

  “No, see, I was fourteen. I mentioned that, right?”

  “A time or two.”

  “And Jennifer started gymnastics after puberty, so her growth wasn’t stunted like the rest of the girls.”

  “Still not sure I’m liking this.”

  “Okay, okay,” he rushed. “You don’t realize this, but at fourteen, for guys, boobs are all that matter. At twenty-eight, I’ve got an entirely different favorite part.”

  I felt the flush sweep through me from face to feet.

  Point taken.

  He chuckled at my easy embarrassment and grabbed onto my other hand to hold it too. Shin to shin, each of us had one leg tucked up on the couch and the other foot on the floor, both hands securely in each others’ hold. I was pretty sure it was one of the best forms of contact I’d ever felt.