Nick
Two o’clock in the morning came with still no sign of Lacy. Chris had gone to bed hours ago. I pulled out the sofa bed and settled down to sleep myself shortly thereafter, though sleep would be impossible until I knew Lacy was home and safe.
After endless tossing and turning, at two-thirty I finally heard a car pull up and stop by the curb in front of the house. A door opened, and laughter rang out as I rose from the bed to look out the window. Though it was too dark out to clearly see who was in the car, the dome-light was bright enough to reveal the driver as a man, and not Susan who had come to pick Lacy up earlier. When I noticed Lacy climbing the steps of the porch, I hurried to the door to greet her, startling her.
“Nick! I didn’t think you’d still be up.”
“Of course, I’m up. I-” I caught a whiff of alcohol as she stepped inside and closed the door. “Are you drunk?”
She cut her eyes away as she pulled off her coat. “No.” Lacy took a step toward the hallway and stumbled. I caught her. “Okay, maybe a little.”
Staring down into her blue eyes, holding her limp, intoxicated body close to mine to keep her upright, I didn’t know what to say. Part of me wanted to scold her for worrying me half the night. Part of me was frantic with jealousy, wondering who the guy in the car was and where they’d been all night. Then a larger part of me, a selfless part of me that hadn’t existed until that very moment, only felt sorrow for Lacy and her numerous woes that had somehow turned excessive drinking into an acceptable option for her.
I smoothed the hair out of her eyes and tried not to lose myself in their depths. Who in the heck was that guy in the car? It wasn’t fair that I had worked so hard to get Kevin out of the picture, only to have to fret over the threat of someone new. I should just kiss her and get it over with. Right now, while she was in my arms with her body pressed so warm and soft against mine. I would only have to tilt and lower my head ever so slightly…
“Don’t look at me like that, Nick,” she whispered softly, her eyes locked on mine.
“How am I looking at you?” I asked, knowing full well that she had to notice the way my gaze kept drifting down to her lips no matter how hard I tried to stop myself. I truly was a creep for even contemplating kissing her when she was drunk. I’d just sunk to a new level of scum if that were possible.
“Like you feel sorry for me.”
At least my real thoughts weren’t as obvious as I feared.
“What if I do feel sorry for you?” I teased, flashing a wink that made her scowl. “I think you’re gonna feel sorry for you too when you wake up with your first hangover in the morning.”
She opened her mouth to respond, but a hiccup came out instead. When I laughed, she smiled and slapped my arm. “You’re so mean!”
“And you’re so drunk. Go sit while I make you some coffee,” I ordered, pointing to the sofa bed. “Then you can tell me what happened.”
“Ugh, no,” she protested with a grimace. “The room is spinning. I just want to go to bed and sleep.”
I released her, only to slide my arm around her waist again a second later when she took a faltering step toward the hallway.
“Alright, little sot, let’s get you to bed then.”
Once I guided her to the bedroom and to the bed, I helped remove her shoes and ushered her beneath the covers.
When I turned to leave, she stopped me by placing her hand on my arm. With her eyes closed, discomfort furrowed her brow. “I feel sick. Will you stay and talk to me until I go to sleep?”
I hesitated, knowing if I sat down, I’d end up lying down. If I lay down beside her, I’d want to hold her. And if I held her, I’d want to touch her and kiss her. But how could I say no to such a pitiful plea?
“Just for a few minutes,” I finally agreed.
I sat down stiffly on the edge of the mattress as far away from her as possible, mentally cursing her for being drunk and making this situation so awkward for me. As if she sensed my unease, she opened her eyes and took in my rigid posture. Her bottom lip quivered, and tears sprang to the corners of her eyes.
“Nick?”
“Yeah, Lace?” I answered, brushing the hair from her face, openly reveling in her beauty and hoping she was too drunk to notice.
“When was the last time you talked to anyone from home?”
I let out a loud sigh and sat back with my arms crossed over my chest. “It’s been a week or so. Why?”
She sniffled and wiped away a lone tear that slipped down her cheek. “I know momma would be disappointed in me if she saw me right now.”
“Oh, Lace, don’t think things like that.”
She swallowed hard and closed her eyes again. “You’re not mad that I came home drunk, are you? I don’t want you thinking I’m rude and ungrateful. I couldn’t stand it if you were mad at me.”
I pulled her up and into my arms. She laid her head on my shoulder, letting out a silent sob against my chest. “I’m not mad at you, Lace. I could never be mad at you.”
She responded with a shallow nod, and after a few minutes of rocking her to soothe her troubled spirits, her light snoring whispered against the crook of my neck. Laying her back on the pillow, I planted the softest of kisses to her temple and watched her sleep for a few more moments. I started to leave her alone, but as I pulled my arm from around her shoulders, she let out a moan of protest and groggily mumbled, “Not yet.”
I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t sleep in the same bed with her. Even if I didn’t lay a finger on her, it would still feel like I was taking advantage of the situation. No. If there was an honorable bone in my body, I needed to dredge it up tonight and leave her alone.
She saved me from my impossible choice by falling back to sleep, and I went back out to the safety of my own bed.
Nick
I had just finished showering and securing a towel around my waist when an urgent and insistent knocking forced me to unlock the bathroom door. Lacy barreled in, dropping to her knees by the toilet in the classic morning-after throes. I hurried to her side, holding her hair out of the way until she was done.
Groaning as though she were on the verge of death, she swore, “Oh, God, I’ll never drink again as long as I live.”
“Yes, you will,” I assured her, wetting a rag to wipe the sweat from her brow. “I’ve said the same thing a thousand times.”
“You didn’t mean it like I do.” I placed the cool cloth against her forehead, and she moaned with relief. “Thank you.”
Lacy dry-heaved for a few more minutes before she finally sat back against the wall beside the commode, breathing heavy and hard, her eyes closed with relief and exhaustion.
“Whatever a Long Island Iced Tea is, remind me never to drink another one,” she said, sounding like she did indeed mean it.
“Ooh,” I agreed with a grimace. “Yeah, I bet it didn’t take much being your first time and all.” Fishing for more details about her evening, and her party companions, I asked, “How much did you drink? You were pretty tore up when you got home. You crashed before you could tell me about it.”
“We just hung out at Susan’s house,” she explained. “I only had two. I was fine for the first one, and then that second one snuck up on me.”
She lunged for the toilet again, but when nothing else came up, she sat back down with a groan. While she rested, I rose and turned to the sink. Still swathed only in my towel, without a bone of shame in my body, I commenced with my morning shave.
I felt her eyes on me. She’d seen me perform simple bathroom rituals. Three people were living in a house with only one bathroom. Out of desperation and necessity, we had each been forced to allow each other entrance a few times when we were running late getting ready to leave in the morning. We’d shared the mirror over the sink while I shaved and she fixed her hair often enough that we were growing increasingly uninhibited in carrying out our individual routines. Granted, I’d always worn clothing in front of her until now.
And there wa
s last night when I had walked in to find her wearing the robe. With nothing on underneath. And when she stood up…
I mentally cursed myself for conjuring up images that would cause a visible and embarrassing situation for us both if didn’t get the thoughts under control.
I surreptitiously watched her from the corner of my eye as she openly studied the spread of hair across my chest, and then lower to the trail that started at my navel and disappeared beneath the low-slung towel about my hips. “Never seen a guy without his shirt on, Lace?”
Her cheeks flushed and she quickly looked away, making an immediate attempt to stand up. “Of course, I have.”
Though the tremor in her voice made me suspect she was lying. If there was one thing I knew about the pre-tragedy Lacy, it was that she was too shy and proper to ever find herself in a situation that would involve being alone with a shirtless male, not even my little brother. Still, I couldn’t pass up an opportunity of light-hearted ribbing. “Then why are you so nervous?”
“I’m not nervous.” To prove her claim, she came over to the sink, elbow-nudged me out of the way, and proceeded to brush her teeth, standing closer than necessary so she could stare down my reflection in the mirror with an I told-you-so smirk when she finished.
“Very well then,” I said with a chuckle, giving her a reciprocal elbow and taking my place back in front of the mirror with my razor. While she brushed out her hair beside me, I asked, “So did you have fun last night?”
“Yep,” she answered quickly. Too quickly.
“You like your new friends?”
“They’re okay. I guess you could say that we have a few things in common.”
I wanted her to elaborate, to confess to me who the dude was, but when she saw the curiosity in my expression, she grew fidgety and refused to look at me again. “Are you almost done? I need a shower.”
“Yeah sure,” I said, letting the subject drop for the time being.
Lacy
After spending so much time rehearsing with Susan, Alex, and Dorian in their studio every day, I grew to genuinely like them all. Of course, I couldn’t have been more opposite from the three of them, with their confidence and ostentatious personalities, but those were the things I liked about them most. Even if we hadn’t gotten along so well, I would have put up with our differences regardless because I loved being part of Alex’s band, Gridlock.
If only our after-school rehearsals didn’t cut into my time with Nick. I missed him picking me up after school. Instead, Dorian picked up Susan each afternoon as soon as classes ended, and then after my hour of practice in the auditorium, Alex appeared to fetch me. The four of us would then meet at Alex and Susan’s studio for our band rehearsal. This had become our daily routine over the past two weeks, and our efforts had paid off tonight.
We performed for Alex’s uncle tonight, and he agreed to keep Gridlock on as the regular weekend gig at his club, Static.
Hours later, when Alex dropped me off by the curb in front of the house, I was still pulsing from the excitement of my first live performance with the group. If only I could share my joy with Nick. But I didn’t dare.
I had been lying to him—and thereby avoiding him—for the past two weeks, making up one reason or another for why I was staying out late in the evenings, and why I no longer needed him to pick me up after school. I had fed him excuse after excuse. Working with Susan on a group history report. Studying with her for our physics projects. The two of us doing research at the library for our English term papers. The two of us simply hanging out, doing high-school girl things, enjoying the newness of our genuine friendship.
Nick bought my stories without question and refrained from drilling me about my new friends. I decided that he either didn’t care or didn’t want to pry into my personal affairs. I was his roommate, not his daughter, after all. He must have felt that it wasn’t his place to demand explanations. If he minded me coming home late each night, he didn’t scold me. Instead, he seemed content to let me come and go as I pleased as long as I stayed out of trouble.
Tonight, when I gently eased the front door open at two in the morning, his quiet snore was barely audible over the voice of the late-night talk show host he had dozed off watching. The flickering light from the television was the only illumination in the living room, and my sights automatically fell upon Nick, asleep on his sofa bed.
He had tossed and turned in his sleep; now the sheet twisted up about his legs, leaving his bare torso exposed. As always, my fascination with Nick’s body drew me closer to his sleeping side. I stared down at him for a few moments in hedonistic awe, wondering what the sleek muscles of his broad chest would feel like if I dared touch him.
It seemed lately that I was always eager to look at Nick, always excited over the prospect of an opportunity to visually explore him. He had almost caught me watching him several times, but I managed to avert my eyes just in time. With him asleep, I didn’t have to worry. I could devour every hard, glorious detail of him and he was never the wiser.
Suddenly he stirred. I froze, not even daring to breathe. He rearranged one arm across his stomach, and the other up over his head. He worked his lips. The muscle in his jaw twitched. And then his heavy breathing resumed. I closed my eyes and let out a slow breath of relief, deciding it best not to push my luck.
After switching off the television, I fetched a blanket from the bedroom, changed into a pair of pajamas, and returned to the kitchen. The back door, off to the rear of the kitchen in the small laundry room, creaked the slightest bit when I pulled it open, but I knew from experience that it wasn’t loud enough to wake Nick.
The moon was bright, and the stars were out, glowing brilliantly against the otherwise clear sky. I spread out my blanket in the backyard and sat with my knees drawn up to my chest, reveling in the night noises. A cat or a raccoon sifted through the neighbors’ trash bin on the other side of the tall privacy fence. A siren wailed in the distance, far away from our urban neighborhood. Then all was quiet.
With the image of a beautiful, sleeping Nick still so fresh in my head, I closed my eyes and found a million notes there. My mind mentally buzzed to life with a new musical creation. Chords flew through my head with blaring crescendos and faint pianissimos. Soon a violin accompanied, along with flutes and clarinets. The song was so real and alive in my head that I scolded my imagination to play softer so not to wake anyone. Finally, I decided to go inside to grab some staff paper. If I didn’t, the song would be gone in the morning, claimed as a casualty of sleep. Some mornings I woke to remember bits and pieces, but more often than not, my recall was sadly disappointing. If I couldn’t get the notes on paper when they were fresh in my head, they seldom revisited me in their original glory. And this song was Nick-inspired. It was a song I wanted to keep.
I hurried back into the house, replaying the tune in my head over and over so I wouldn’t forget it. I tiptoed through the kitchen toward the hallway, intent on retrieving the ream of staff paper from my backpack in the bedroom.
“Lace?”
I jumped to a stop and yelped.
“Jeez, you scared me,” I whispered, as Nick sat up and switched on the table lamp.
He scratched his chest as he yawned. His eyes fluttered a few times, and when they focused on me, his sleepy smile melted my heart. “Hey there, you. Whatcha doin’?”
He patted the empty spot on the bed beside him and scooted over to make room for me, so I joined him. “I had a new song stuck in my head and couldn’t sleep, so I was getting my notebook to write it down. I’m sorry if I woke you.”
“I used to be the same way with my painting,” he confessed through another yawn. He fluffed his pillow up behind him to prop up straighter. “I’d be up at all hours. Mom used to get so mad at me.” He glanced at the glowing digital clock built into the video player on top of the television. “Shit, is it really almost three in the morning?”
I hadn’t realized it was so late. “I’m sorry I woke you. I’ll leave you
alone so you can go back to sleep.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m awake now anyway.” He touched my arm when I started to rise, so I reluctantly stayed put.
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Stay and talk to me for a little while. I hardly ever get to see you anymore since you’ve been hanging out with Susan so much lately. We never get to talk.”
I leaned back against the pillow beside him and tried to relax. He had no idea how uncomfortable it was to sit beside him when he was so scantily dressed. Kevin had never made me feel so flustered and anxious!
What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I control my wayward thoughts long enough to have a conversation with him?
“So, how is school going?” he asked.
“Good.”
He nodded. I nodded. He fidgeted with the hem of the sheet still tucked about his waist. I fidgeted with my fingernails.
“How about you?” I asked, not daring more than a glance in his direction lest I stare.
“Good.”
“Good,” I echoed, feeling foolish for not being able to act more natural with him.
I closed my eyes and swore to myself. I had to do better than this.
Suddenly, Nick’s fingers swept across my cheek and behind my ear. When I started from the unexpected contact, he jerked his hand away.
“Your hair… It was…”
I let out a shaky breath and tried to smile.
“Why are you so nervous, Lace? Is it because of your new boyfriend?”
I finally turned to face him as my genuine, spontaneous laughter erupted for the first time in months.
“What?” he asked, confused by my reaction.
“Alex?”
“Is that his name? The guy who brings you home every night?”
My heart warmed that Nick cared for me enough to try and talk with me about Alex. Alex was obviously older. Of course, Nick would feel he had a reason to be concerned. I was his charge. He had vowed to my father that he would care for me and protect me for as long as I was under his guardianship.
Breaking Lacy (Nick & Lacy Book 1) Page 16
