Delia Bay

by Lauren Cooper

  I had the sudden urge for a stiff drink and decided that was exactly what I was going to do. Grabbing my coat from the back, I lace my bag across my body and pull my hood up. Locking the door behind me to Moonbeam I double check it before turning and heading towards Gus’.

  Raincoats & Short Shorts

  I’D STORMED INTO GUS’ like a bat out of hell. I was pissed that I’d run my mouth, so god damned easily to Luna. It was like talking to an old friend, someone I knew, someone I trusted, when in reality I didn’t know her at all. I hadn’t spoken to anyone about Aurora for years. It just ripped open old wounds and left me bleeding and miserable for days and this was just the start of it.

  I was at rock-bottom and I’d been here too damned long. Scratch that, there was rock bottom, fifty million feet of shit then me. That’s how low I’d sunk.

  There she was living, while all I wanted to do was die. That’s all I could think about when I was sat on the floor of her shop. How much Luna was living her life and I was just another bystander.

  I hadn’t noticed when the rain had started to pour, the coolness against my skin felt like a balm against the raging fire inside me, something I welcomed instead of repelled. I didn’t show Luna my embarrassment of her finding me on the street, it was something I wasn’t fond on rehashing. I wasn’t about to tell the woman I barely knew that I was used to sitting on the streets in the pouring rain because I’d lived in it for a year, or that it was a welcome reprieve from my otherwise hollow self. I knew I’d said enough to bait the innocent girl into bugging me for the rest of eternity I’m sure and as soon as I’d realized I made my excuses and left.

  I shoved Aurora in the staff room out back, downed a glass of water to rid of the dryness in my mouth from all my stupid words that came spilling out onto Luna’s shop floor before I strip my jacket off and attempt to ring my T-shirt out of rain water.

  “You’re early” Gus’ sticks his head around the doorframe, the skin around his cheeks looking tanned and flushed. The old man laughs when I raise any eyebrow at him.

  “Don’t ask what you don’t wanna know kid” he taps his temple with his long, wrinkly finger and I tut in disgust.

  “You know you gotta treat ladies better than that old man” I tsk moving towards the doorway.

  “I treated her damn right I’ll have you know!” he sniggers as I brush past him.

  “Hmm, ask her that shall I?”

  “You leave Ms. Bethel out of this” he wags the same finger in my face and I huff on a forced laugh.

  “Good for you’ old man” I tap him on the back and head up front. The bark of laughter that leaves Gus’ mouth makes me smile. He loves it when I slap him on the back, makes him feel young apparently. The bar’s empty aside from two old guys sat in the corner reading the paper with a pint, the sky still dull and grey outside the windows has put people off walking down the walk but the rain has stopped, for now. The promenade is practically empty, aside from the few lunatics that remind me of Luna who are braving the surf. I grab the remote for the music system and chuck on some regular rock, nothing too heavy or loud for this time of day. Wyatt comes from out back carrying a crate of rattling bottles.

  “Hey” he tilts his head in my direction, the too long blonde mop atop his head falling in his eyes.

  “Hey kid, come ‘ere” I tilt my head towards the quieter corner of the bar and wait patiently as he drops the crate to the wooden countertop and stomps his way over to me in his dirty boots.

  “What’s up?” he shoves his hands into his front pockets, the worn denim looking like it could do with a damn good wash but that’s not what I called him over for.

  “You know of anyone who sells?” I widen my eyes slightly, hoping he gets what I’m actually asking him. The young’un smirks, his eyes scanning the room quickly before he tilts his head towards the stock room.

  I follow his lead and tuck myself into the dark corner.

  “I do” he pulls out a bag of the good stuff, the green herb that helps me forget for a while.

  “Sweet” I take the bag from him and slip him a twenty.

  “This ones on me. Just be sure to be a recurring customer and keep your mouth shut” he nods in my direction, this new confidence surprising the hell out of me.

  “Can I trust you not to go blabbing to the town Sheriff?” I glare at him, eyes wide with threat but Wyatt just smirks at me.

  “You wanna sweeten Sheriff Corby? You should be talking to Luna” he laughs before turning on his heel.

  What the fuck did that mean? I find myself scowling after him, my eyes now burning a hole in the back of his band T. Sweeten the Sheriff? Why would Luna know how to do tha....

  Fuck.

  She’s fucking him.

  And me.

  What kind of small town bullshit was that? I could never compete with the damned Sheriff. I bet he was just the type of bloke Luna was supposed to be with too. The white picket fence, straight up kinda-guy who would treat her right her whole damned life. I knew I couldn’t do that, the whole vanilla, normal life thing. I hadn’t so far, and I wasn’t about to start now. Besides, I was the asshole who’d leave a bitter taste in your mouth just by passing by. I wasn’t destined for nice things, sweet things like Luna. I’d just have to suck it up and get over the sweet-as-sin girl who’d sucked me into oblivion last night with the warmth and wetness between her legs.

  Today was going to be a long ass day.

  I shove the small bag of herb into my wallet, suddenly eager to get home and smoke the shit out of it, just as the front door swings open, sending a sudden cold breeze right through the bar and getting me back to work.

  “Hey, what can I get’cha?” I tilt my chin in the general direction of the guy, placing my hands on the bar.

  “Beer please” he knocks the bar with his knuckles as I busy myself pulling his pint.

  “You’re the new guy huh?” He asks, sitting on one of the bar stools.

  “Yep”

  “I’m Austin” he holds his hand out for me to shake and I do, his strong hold on my hand a silent warning not to fuck with him. Note taken but I’m on a war path anyway so if I die in a bar fight so be it.

  “How are you finding Delia so far?” he asks after releasing my hand and collecting his pint.

  “Not bad. Still haven’t had much of a chance to get around” I shrug, taking the bill he hands me.

  “Well, I work down on the beach, at the surf school if you ever want a tour guide. Or just someone to drink with” he laughs, easing the testosterone fueled tension between us.

  “Thanks” I hand him his change just as the door swings open again. A bright ball of yellow barrels towards us before I can even process the situation and then I see her blue eyes.

  “Hey!” Luna kisses Austin on the cheek briefly before removing her bright yellow rain coat and stunning me silent.

  “Hey Reid” she smiles in my direction, but I can only manage a nod in return.

  “You’ve met Austin then?” she asks, sliding onto the bar stool next to him after draping her coat over the back. Glancing between the two they share a look I can’t decipher but right now my insides are knotting up and I feel sick.

  Is he her boyfriend?

  Is she fucking him too?

  “Drink?” Austin turns towards her slightly, Luna smiles sweetly and then looks at me, her bright eyes sparkling and not in the slightest looking like she’s trying to hide something.

  “I’ll have a Whiskey please”

  I swallow the memories of that night and busy myself grabbing her a tumbler and filling it with three fingers.

  “Thanks”

  “So, weather’s pretty shit huh?” Austin tilts his beer back and I find myself raising an eyebrow at him. Luna bursts out laughing, the sound like music to my ears, travelling down my spine to my heart where some of the cracks there start to fuse together.

  “Are we really gonna sit here and talk ‘bout the weather?” Luna asks, her laughter dying down.


  “Just tryna make conversation” Austin shrugs.

  “You’re such an idiot” Luna shakes her head. Glancing between the two of them I can’t see them not being together, but the way Luna’s speaking to him tells me somethings not quite right. But then again what the fuck do I know? It’s been nearly ten years since my last relationship and I was a naïve kid then.

  “You got a girl Reid?” Austin asks, his eyes kind, the warning in his eyes from earlier long gone. I force myself not to look at Luna, in the off chance she is with him I’m not getting into that mess. That’s her problem not mine, I can’t say I wouldn’t be a bit pissed off but Luna’s too pure to do something like that anyway, I hope.

  “Nah” I shake my head and then look at the beautiful woman sat next to him.

  “Me neither. We’ll have to hit up a few clubs up in town sometime”

  Luna’s eyes twinkle with mischief as she watches relief flood my face. I narrow my eyes at her, the little witch can obviously read my mind.

  “I’ll join you” she chirps, taking a sip of her jack.

  “Girls aren’t invited” Austin shakes his head, smirking in her direction and laughing when he catches my amused grin.

  I grab the cloth from under the bar and give the top a wipe down.

  “Nice Ink man” Austin nods in the direction of my tatted fingers.

  “Cheers” I take a look at the skull on my hand, the cross on one finger, a blade on another. I never really paid much attention to what I was getting on my hands, it was all a blur. I didn’t hate them, but they didn’t really have any meaning behind them either. The three of us chat for a while, the tension in my bones slowly easing the more we talk. Austin tells me about the little quirks of Delia he thinks I might like, the gyms, and the soccer teams and about Jock, the guy who owns the car dealership and how he’d give me a discount as a newbie townie. I’ll admit I got a little excited at the prospect of having the bike sooner rather than later. The adrenaline rush was needed, now more so that this blonde boho had waltzed into my life.

  “Are there any tattoos parlors around here?” I ask as I pass them behind the bar. It was starting to pick up a bit the later in the afternoon it became, Wyatt was dealing with the punters down the other end of the bar and we’d settled into a rhythm already.

  Usually I hated working with people, but Wyatt seemed to like working alone to. Perfect combination for me.

  “Nope. It’s the only thing Delia doesn’t have” Luna shrugs. “The nearest one is the next town over, in Lordell”

  “Oh great” I roll my eyes before heading out back to grab another crate of beer.

  “Take the rest of the night off man, go and enjoy your new buds” Gus grabs me as I round the bar and turn into the small hallway.

  “It’s okay old man”

  “I wasn’t asking” he looks at me over the tip of his nose, it’s his signature look when he’s daring you to argue with him.

  “Fine” I roll my eyes and brush past him anyway, heading to the staff room.

  “It’s good to see you hanging out” he calls after me. I don’t bite but rather mumble incoherent words under my breath. I grab Aurora and make to move when the weight of her in my hand stops me in my tracks. It happens sometimes when I realize I could be carrying a baby around now instead of a guitar. I could be living in the suburbs of Bancroft with my family instead of in a secluded cabin far enough away from people who would ask too many damned questions. I’d have days where I thought I could just get up and call her, leave a message and she’d get back to me later, but I knew deep down I couldn’t. Those messages would go on unanswered for the rest of time. My girl was gone, my baby along with her. We never had the chance to get a scan or see what the sex of the baby was. I couldn’t mourn properly the loss of that little one because there were so many unanswered questions left hanging in the air.

  The only consolation for me was that after the accident they hadn’t performed an autopsy on Aurora and so they’d left our baby alone. It gave me a slither of comfort knowing that our little poppy seed was safe with its mama. Warm and taken care of.

  Or at least that’s what I told myself. I was an adult, not a child. I knew what happened to you when you died. There was no golden gates and stairways destined to take you places that don’t exist. I was raised as a non-believer; did I shout my opinions from the roof tops? Fuck no. If you believed, then good for you. I didn’t. You were worm food when you hit the dirt, and that was the reality I had to live with every goddamned day for the rest of my shitty life.

  My mother, father. My girl and my baby. All beneath the dirt and not one of them would call out to me again. My guitar was the only thing I had left that held them close to me. Aurora at least.

  I walked out to the bar, saw Luna laughing at something Austin had said and decide not to burst their bubble of happiness. No one wants a depressed shit-head in their group anyways.

  The rain had held off, but the air was still damp and chilly. Wrapping my denim around me I headed across the road to the promenade, the wooden planks a little slippery from the rain. I find a spot that’s covered by a veranda from the little ice-cream shop and sit my ass down. Folding my arms over the railings and dangling my legs over the small wall, I watch the waves crashing into the sand. The sound of the water hitting the shore reminds me of the thunder from that night, the way it had cracked so loudly above my head it was almost deafening. I would have given anything to drown out the doctor’s words to me.

  It’s the reason I love going for a walk during thunderstorms now. It takes me back to a time when Aurora was still alive and breathing. Before I’d had that phone call and I’d run the four miles to the hospital in the rain. The burn of the cold water hitting my skin was nothing compared to the fire that blazed in me after the doctor told me to sit down.

  Everyone knows what that means.

  I’d arranged my mother and father’s funeral. I’d got a solicitor to get access to their accounts and pay for all the things they needed at the ripe old age of sixteen. My seventeenth birthday had been just around the corner, but it went by unnoticed. I dropped out of school, losing contact with most of my friends. I couldn’t face the whispers and knowing looks of the other kids in the hallways, the pity in their eyes at the poor lost boy who lost everything. Everywhere I turned in school I saw Aurora, the stolen kisses we’d shared against the lockers, the time we’d argued, and she’d cried her way to the bleachers before I’d eventually got my head out of my ass and gone after her. Eventually I couldn’t keep everything going, I lost everything because I couldn’t pay for a house my parents had worked over thirty years for at sixteen on my shitty minimum wage. By the time it all went through I was seventeen and too old to be put into care. I had no one.

  Bancroft was harsh, a vile place to live in, especially on the streets. I got used to fighting my battles, to scrapping for food and water. I slept on a folded-out card board box for over a year until one day Gus found me rummaging in his dumpster out the back of his bar. I remember vividly how the old man didn’t ask me any questions, just tilted his head in the direction of the open door, ushering me inside.

  Before I knew it, I had a job, an apartment and something to concentrate on other than the desperate need to shoot pure heroin into my veins or a bullet into my brain. I’d never done it but seeing how the other guys on the streets would shoot that shit into their bloodstreams and seemingly fall into total euphoria I wanted nothing more than to join them. Instead I’d opted for the less hard-core shit and smoked my body weight in weed.

  I was cowardly for hanging on to nothing. I didn’t even have a little piece of string that was keeping me tied here. I just couldn’t bring myself to end it. I’d tried, believe me I’d tried. A blade to my wrist, a noose around my neck, a bottle of pills. Nothing worked. I’d fuck it up and do it wrong or I’d chicken out at the last minute. The all-consuming feeling comes and goes every couple of months, the need growing the closer the day gets until I break down.

/>   I know, I’m pathetic.

  “Hey” Luna’s sweet voice sounds from behind me, forcing me to glance over my shoulder. The bright yellow raincoat comes to sit beside me, her bare thigh brushing against my jeans. Why does she insist on wearing such short shorts around me? Her long, tanned legs are a beautiful, unwelcomed distraction.

  “Hi” I mumble, my desperation sounds clearer than ever and I prepare myself for the barrage of questions I have no doubt she’s going to throw at me.

  “It’s beautiful isn’t it?” she smiles sweetly, forcing me to look at her when she doesn’t do as I suspected.

  Her long blonde hair has been tied up in a messy top knot, small strands wisp around her beautiful face in soft curls. Those baby blues shine brightly as the sun starts to set, glimmers of light slicing through the thick clouds every now and again, her gorgeous smattering of freckles lighting up her cute button nose.

  I don’t know what comes over me, but at the same time the sun breaks through the clouds my hand instinctively reaches up and brushes away a strand from her eyes. A sharp inhale has her chest rising and falling beneath her coat when my skin touches hers, but she doesn’t look away. It’s right then, with Luna’s eyes trained on me and mine on her, that I realize that my path on this planet is about to change fucking drastically. The sweet smile that spreads across her plump lips almost shatters me in two. How can I allow myself to be with someone as pure and innocent as Luna? I was filth, the bottom of the pile. I had nothing, no one. I couldn’t give her the things a real man could. A home, a life that she could be proud of. But that damned warm, fuzzy feeling in my belly wouldn’t quit. One fucking night and here am I getting sick over a girl. A girl that isn’t Aurora.