Before & After

by Nazarea Andrews

  "Me. I drew it up." The dark-haired dude is clean cut, and he flushes, rocking back on his heels nervously. Like he knows it's not good. "It's just an idea."

  I stare at the drawing for a minute longer. "What does it mean?"

  Twenty minutes later, I retreat as the guys make an appointment and Arsenal gives me a quick, muttered, “Thank you. I duck into the back stall where Scott is already laid out, his head pillowed on his arms while Staci goes to work.

  "Did Arsenal need some artistic input?" she asks, and despite the fact that she's bent over my best friend's back, I can hear the gin in her tone.

  "Yeah. Dude wants a reaper." She snorts and I nod. "I'm tweaking it. It'll be more Charon and the river Styx than reaper and birds, but he'll love it."

  "Make sure Arsenal gives you a cut. That's original artwork so you know he'll charge for that shit."

  I nod, but I don't plan on following through. I love the shop, and I love the art that goes into it. But I'm not so talented that I think I should be paid for my shit drawings. If some douchebag wants it tattooed on his back, that's his business, not mine.

  "You good, bro?" I ask, and Scott grunts, a strained noise. I glance at what Staci is bent over and make a low noise of sympathy.

  It hurts like a bitch to have your spine tattooed. I sit down in the corner of the booth, slumped on the ground, and listen to the rhythmic start and stop of the tattoo machine, the smell of ink and antiseptic filling my senses as all the stress of the week, of the fight with Peyton, slips away.

  I fucking love this place. It's probably the only place I can get close to feeling what I do onstage, when there is only the high of the music and the energy of the crowd as they chant along to my songs.

  “You know, you’re a good artist," Staci says, her voice quiet as she works. "You'd do good here."

  I blink out of my thoughts and stare at her. She's watching me with careful, bright eyes and I laugh, a startled noise. "You aren't serious."

  "Why not? It'd be nice to work with a real artist, instead of someone who just copies the shit he finds online. You do good with the clients. And you’re both here enough. Why the fuck not?"

  I stare at her for a long moment, and then laugh. Shake my head.

  "I think it's a good idea."

  Her voice snaps my head up and Scott lifts his lazily, earning a swat from Staci while she barks, "Stay still for fuck’s sake."

  I barely hear it. Peyton is standing in front of me, looking faintly sick to her stomach as she clutches her bag like a shield and stares at me with wide, wide eyes.

  She's so fucking gorgeous it hurts, and seeing her, something in my gut settles, a shard that was out of place sliding where it belongs with a sick snick that makes my stomach churn and my head spin.

  It feels right.

  I told her I wanted to know now if this was just a distraction, wanted to know before it was too late to get out without getting hurt.

  But staring at her, I know the truth. It's too late already. Maybe it's always been too late where she's concerned.

  This girl will break me into a thousand pieces, and I won't even care. I'll shatter with a smile and thank her for the chance to care about her, even from a distance.

  "What are you doing here?" I ask, pushing to my feet. She's standing close enough that when I rise, I'm almost pressed against her, and for a moment, all I can smell is sunshine and sugar and her. I sway close to her without meaning to.

  “We need to talk,” she says softly. I glance back at Scott. The session has just started and he’ll be under Staci’s machine for the next two hours, while she traces ink up and down his spine in intricate clockwork.

  “Go,” he says gritting his teeth when the needle bumps over his spine and I nod once. Grab her hand and pull her out of the stall and onto the sunlit sidewalk outside Dragon’s Head Tattoo. I let her go almost immediately and she shifts, nerves playing over her features.

  “Talk,” I say and she lets out the breath she’s been holding. I can hear the frustration in her huff, but I ignore it. I can’t let myself care about that right now.

  Even knowing I’m being an ass, I can’t let myself care.

  “You want to sit down or something?”

  I shrug, and slip my shades on. It’s a dick move, hiding behind the mirrored lenses. I do it anyway. "What are you doing here, Peyton?"

  "I'm the daughter of a southern Baptist small town politician," she says, abruptly. "Daddy started out a doctor--had a real nice family practice. But it wasn't enough, and when I was in middle school, he went into politics. It became everything our family was. He was mayor and then our representative in the state legislature, and it just--it never ended. Every election was a new step and it didn't ever stop."

  I stare at her, and she shrugs. "Everyone expected me to be a good little southern belle. Perfect Daddy's girl at the political dinners and events and rallies. And I was. I was really good at it. I played my perfect part really well."

  There's something in her tone that has me nervous and I shift, reaching for her. She jerks back, out of my reach. "Just. Let me say this," she almost begs, and I nod.

  "I hated it. I was good at it, and I did what they expected, but I hated it. I got involved in drugs. Nothing too serious, just shit that I knew would piss off my parents, if they were to find out. Binge drinking and random hookups." She laughs as my stomach churns. "Sometimes I think it's a miracle I made it through high school. I was the epitome of self-destructive. But the part that really fucked me and my parents up was the eating disorder." She takes a deep breath and digs into her bag, pulling out a beat up journal that she extends to me silently. "You want the truth. Want to know what I'm keeping to myself. It's in there."

  I'm shaking my head and stepping away from her even while she's still speaking. Because I might want the truth, but I sure as fuck don't want it that way, because she thinks she has to give it to me. "I want it when you’re ready to share," I growl.

  "I'm never going to be ready to share this, Jokes. That's the thing. I hate who I was. It's why I left and came here. Why I don't talk about my past and where I came from, why I rarely go home, and have almost nothing to do with my family. Because I don't want to be that girl anymore and the only way I know how to be someone else is to BE someone else. I don't keep you on the outside because I want you there. I keep you on the outside because I'm still trying to figure out who the hell I am."

  "You're Peyton," I snap, fiercely, stepping into her and pulling her against my body with a hand on her waist. "You’re mine and you’re fucking perfect. I don't give a fuck what your past was."

  She smiles sadly. "You do. You might not want to care, but you do. You can't help it. It pissed me off to no end that you almost fucked Lindsay. It was a fucked move. I get it. I get why you were upset."

  I stare at her and she lifts a hand, the tips of her fingers brushing over the stubble on my jaw, higher to push into my hair, and I lean into her, my forehead resting against hers. "It doesn't matter."

  "Look at it. Read it. Then tell me that." She kisses me, a brief press of her lips and the hint of summer sweet sugar before she pulls back.

  Chapter 14: After

  It's carving my future into your

  Skin, with lips and fingertips,

  Twisting our lives together until there

  Is no way to be

  Anything but us.

  Mapping the ink and curves

  Of you until I know them

  Like my own soul.

  (Rike’s poems to Peyton )

  “You ok?” he asks, and I glance at him. I’m reeling from what Lindsay told me.

  She was getting married. I was her best friend, the maid of honor, the only person in Austin she really cared about besides Scott and Rike. It was us four against the whole world and we were fucking winning.

  It was us two, privileged debutantes, and them, bad boys with tattoos and a past that made me cringe. And we made it work. We thrived.

  And then i
t shattered.

  Sometimes, the fairy tale is too fucking good to be true.

  That was the only time Lindsay sounded bitter. And she had been. She’d been furious. I get it, though. She was on the edge of having it all—and something as senseless as a distracted cab driver snatched it away.

  I might recover. I might get my memories back. But Lindsay would never walk away from the devastation of the accident.

  “How is Scott?” I ask. His gaze flicks to me, startled. I shrug. “What’s happening to me doesn’t affect just you, and his fiancée is in that hospital still. How is he dealing with everything?”

  Rike blows out a breath and flicks the blinker on, hitting the highway and speeding up. “He’s a mess,” he says honestly. “He should be on his honeymoon, and riding the wave of his band’s success. Instead, he’s spent the last month figuring out how the hell to keep her from leaving him and how he’s going to take care of her.”

  I jerk around, staring at him. “Why the hell would she leave him?”

  “Because she’s scared. Because she wants what’s best for him and always has. She won’t think that’s her, now that she’s in a wheelchair. Lindsay—she’s the best thing that could have happened to Scott. But it’s not easy being with him, and she won’t be the person to make his life harder unnecessarily.”

  “But she loves him,” I protest shrilly.

  His gaze slides to me and a bitter smile tugs the corner of one lip up. “Sometimes love isn’t enough, Peyton.”

  He hits the blinker again, swerving for the exit, and I clutch at the door of the truck. We’re getting off the highway, and I glance out the window.

  “Where are we? I thought we were going to get lunch.”

  “We are,” he say.

  The house he pulls up to is in a well-cared for neighborhood. The grass is a dirty green, and the flowerbeds a little overgrown, but there’s a wraparound porch with comfortable looking patio furniture, and a privacy fence hides the backyard.

  I look at Rike, confused, and he grins at me. “I didn’t say where we were going, sweetheart. But this has been your favorite place to have lunch since the day we moved in.”

  “This is our home?” I whisper, even though I knew. Of course it is. What else could it possibly be?

  There is a tiny part of me, staring at this gorgeous house, that wants to race inside and soak it all in. Remember everything. Lie in the bed where I was happy.

  A bigger part—the larger part—is terrified, and for a moment, I’m stuck to my seat, staring.

  Rike pulls open the door and holds out his hand. His eyes are hopeful. And before I consciously make the decision, I put my hand in his and let him pull me from the truck. Against his body, all hard and hot against my own.

  “Are you going to behave if we go in there?” I ask huskily, and then flush. I can’t believe I just asked that.

  A slow smile curls his lips. “Do you want me to?”

  I laugh, and step back. Because I’m a little terrified about how much I really don’t want him to.

  “Come on,” he says, handing me the crutches and pacing me up to the door. I kinda love the way he’s so carefully attentive, his hand on the small of my back to brace me as I make my way up the three stairs to the front door before he swings it open.

  The house is messy—not terribly surprising considering that I’ve been in the hospital. And it’s huge. I glance at Rike. “Did we live here alone?”

  “No. It was originally a house with an apartment, and we thought it’d be perfect for us. The apartment has a small kitchen, so when we want privacy, we just go upstairs. And your studio is in the garage loft. Scott and I keep most of our shit in the garage, and that’s where he’ll practice with the band when they’re just fucking around. Lindsay works downtown, so she didn’t get an office, but we all have our space. And when we don’t want the space, we’re together.”

  His eyes are bright and almost stupid happy as he talks about it and I can see it, can picture the life he’s painting out.

  “Where is our room?” I ask, softly.

  His eyebrows go up, and he points toward the back of the house.

  “Do you want to see it?” The question is soft and very vulnerable.

  “No,” I say. “Not today.” He nods and steps into the large kitchen. Pulls a bowl of soup from the fridge and starts heating it, and pouring us both tea. He’s efficient and brisk in his movements, a graceful poetry in motion doing something so simple and mundane.

  But there is nothing simple or mundane about Rike. He’s gorgeous, with his shaggy black hair and the beard that is growing on me. The tattoos curving on his long, strong arms and licking across the skin over his fingers.

  He’s everything I never expected to want, but this feels familiar. He’s who I chose. This unconventional, beautifully confusing life.

  Scott and Lindsay.

  They are the life I chose.

  “How did we get here?” I whisper, and Rike’s gaze snags mine. I shake my head, helplessly. “This isn’t what I pictured, Rike. This is nothing like I imagined my life. And I understand that it’s what I chose. But I don’t remember, and I can’t reconcile it.” His expression falls, and I make a tiny noise, reaching for him. “I am trying, Rike. I just—it’s a lot.”

  “I know,” he whispers. “I want to help, but I don’t know how. I don’t know how to give you the space you need when all I want is to bring you home.”

  I reach for him and catch his hand, twisting our fingers together. He stares at our fingers, until the microwave dings and it jerks both of us out of our thoughts.

  The soup and crusty bread he brings out is delicious, creamy potato broth with a spicy sausage. But the tension between us strings tight and uncomfortable, and it makes my stomach twist, until I finally put the food down.

  Rike is waiting, because as soon as I stop eating, he shifts, gathering the bowls and taking them to the sink.

  “There’s some stuff in your office. I think you should look at it. Will you come upstairs with me?”

  I nod, and he grins, shifting over to me and lifting me up from the chair.

  “What are you doing?” I breathe out as he cradles me against his chest.

  His eyes are so close, so blue I could get lost in them, and I have to look down, because I can’t get lost. Not yet. Not until I’ve found myself.

  “Stairs, sweetheart. I’ll carry you up.”

  The loft is captivating. Half-finished canvases sit on easels, a sketch and tiny cut piece of papers waiting to be assembled cover a large table, and sculptures clutter a corner in various states of finish. A stained glass window filters light in, beautiful and ethereal, and I feel like I’m in a church. Like this is where I am supposed to worship, and where everything is right. Rike sets me on a deep red leather chaise lounge in a corner of bookshelves and I shiver. The table next to the chaise holds a notebook.

  He follows my gaze. “You wrote constantly. Sometimes it was things you’d share with me or Linds, but it was usually just for yourself, and it was incessant.”

  “Do you think that reading the journals could help me remember?” I ask.

  He nods without hesitation. “Yes. And they’re yours. Please. Go through them.”

  I nod and shift back, getting comfortable against the chair, and he smiles, his eyes soft. “I remember when I bought that chair for you. It was right after we moved here, and we had been out, downtown. You saw it at this tiny place that sold art and you fixated. Brought it up every few days for weeks. So I went down and picked it up one night after I finished a pretty big piece on a client. Surprised you with it. It was like watching a kid on Christmas morning. I fell in love with you a little more that day.” He laughs, a little, at himself. “I fell in love with you a little more every day, Peyton.”

  I make a tiny noise, and his gaze snaps to me.

  Later, when I think about it, I’ll be sure he moved first. But the truth is we moved at the same time. I reach for him at the same time
he wraps a hand around my neck, lifting me up.

  His lips meet mine, and the world explodes. Everything is about him, about the rough urgency of his lips against mine, and his hands that shift me, just the right angle to my head. His tongue licks over the seam of my lips and I gasp, and he’s everywhere, his tongue tangling with mine.

  He’s not just kissing me. He’s devouring and conquering, claiming me. And I make a tiny little noise, almost a mewl, and let him.

  His body comes down, knees on either side of me, and I want more of his weight, more of that maddening lazy tongue, more of his clever fingers, brushing over my skin, everywhere and nowhere.

  “More,” I gasp, and he grins against my lips.

  “More what, perfect girl?” he murmurs. “Tell me what you want.”

  Tell him what I want? How the hell am I supposed to do that? I shake my head and his lips skate down my jaw, over my throat in wet, nipping kisses that have me aching. He pushes my shirt, a blue button-down over a white, lace-trimmed cami, aside, and his fingers are on my breasts, circling and circling, endless torture. “Do you want my mouth here?” he murmurs, and I flush.

  Why can’t he just fuck me? Why must he hear it? His fingers ghost over my nipple, pinch sharply, and I gasp, “Yes.”

  Rike makes a low growl and yanks my cami down, shoving aside the pale pink bra cup and I moan as the wet heat of his mouth closes over me, pulling hard on my nipple. His teeth rake over it and I almost come off the damn chaise. His hands are moving, one cupping my breast through the clothes, the other skating lower, sliding under the hem of my shirt to play over my torso. His tongue circles my nipple, slow and lazy, and I jerk on his hair, pulling him up and kissing him. He groans, and I can almost feel him fighting to pull away. His gaze is clouded and hungry when he demands, “What do you want, Peyton? Do you want my fingers”—he brushes against me over my jeans with his fingers and I shiver—“or do you want my tongue?” I shudder, my head falling back. A low chuckle rolls over me. “Tell me, sweetheart. Tell me what you want. Tell me how bad you want to come riding my lips.”