A shiver tears down my spine. Damn body has given me away.
“You cold?” he says.
I pull back and force a smile. “Nah, all good. Let me get this thing for you.”
I come back into the living room, hearing Seth’s voice howling laughter and Tris whining noo to, I assume, Mum. As much as I love watching them play and laugh and cry, I pray they won’t come here.
Nate doesn’t notice me arrive initially. He’s leaning against the back of the couch, hands dug in his pockets, not all to interested by whoever is almost naked on TV. Then he does look up, sees me hiding his “thing” behind my back like I’m a cheeky three-year-old and I can’t help but grin. He fights to keep a straight face, too.
“Okay,” I admit, sitting, “it’s yours now, but I had to make it to get you here.”
His face is inquisitive, certainly not giddy, so I power on.
I pull the photo book around into my lap and turn my back slightly, facing his front so we can both look at it the right way. Of course, this means he’s more to my side and behind, which I try to not think about. I also decide to breathe through my mouth, because without seeing him front on, and imagining what his expression is like, breathing in his sweet, woody scent is too much.
“Here,” I begin on the cover page.
“This is a book full of all the reasons why I appreciate you.
“This first image is our group before school camp. You’d just eaten chilli noodles for a bet so your cheeks were flamed up, your eyes watering, your throat too tight to explain your pain, but I knew exactly what was happening to you by the various stages of pained looks in your eyes. I felt bad laughing since your eyes were red and glassy from the chilli, so I caught you around your shoulders and held you like a little kid just as the teacher took the one and only photo of us before we set off on the bus. We are trapped hugging forever on camera there, now, and I remember that was much better than a stiff smile like everyone else. I laughed and when you asked why I was shaking, I told you it was because I smelt some chilli from you and it made me feel weird.”
When I finish the story of that first photo, I’m let down. I imagined a scenario where Nate shifted his knee behind my ass, the other one splayed out, so I would be between his legs. But I didn’t expect it, which makes the letdown easier to forget.
He hasn’t actually moved, except I can feel his presence looming over my shoulder a touch more. The back of my neck warms while I pause and contemplate him internally, followed by my skin breaking out in goosebumps.
Nate picks up my arm, studies it, and then rubs away the bumps there.
Purposely, I don’t look. I am falling in love with these grabs at events all over again and don’t want to be the one to assume, ruin whatever we’ve got here.
I flick to one of a knot in a tree trunk. “You had just joined the Photography class and I begrudgingly signed up too, since I didn’t really have a choice but to keep you company, you said. The first shoot, we went out into the yard and took photos of all the interesting things we loved. You said you loved that knot because the rest of the trunk was so smooth and perfect, and the knot was messy and shapeless and rough and spoke to you.”
As I come out of that photo, I flick the page, to turn to the next photo Nate took from early on in his photography days, but his hand comes out of nowhere and stops the page from turning. He holds his hand to the film cover, the photo on that page, where I’ve taped the picture to the side and decorated two opposing corners with some designs to fill the space.
“You know,” Nate says, “there’s beauty in the imperfect sometimes.”
So close—to good or bad—I don’t want to turn and change this. Not seeing him, but feeling him behind me, smelling his scent now I’ve allowed myself to take him in. I fight the urge to turn to jelly and collapse.
I place my fingers over each corresponding finger of his on the photo. Both of us begin working our fingers together, rubbing shapes onto each other’s skin.
I dig my head into my chest cavity. “I never wanted to do that with him.”
“How could you? I thought …” Pause. His breath, sharp. “I thought I heard some people fucking in the toilets or something and then when I heard talk spread …”
I know, I think. Don’t tell me how it felt like your heart was torn up, stomped on and eaten by acid. I put it all on myself and felt the exact same thing when I realised what the fuck I’d done.
“I want to pretend it never happened. But did you really? Did he do that to you against the wall? Did you touch him? Anywhere? At all?”
“I kissed him, we made out for a moment or two but I swear I didn’t touch him. Just over his jocks. He just … did that stuff to me.”
Nate grunts, the result of gritting his teeth. “Okay.”
I don’t dare ask for more explanation.
“I don’t expect you to understand how my head works, because I’m still trying to figure out why I did it, but I didn’t even want to touch him.”
Nate’s lips come to my ear, and he traces my skin with his lip. “Back up,” he whispers.
I shuffle back, but he catches my waist. “No, not like that. Back up to the part where you said you don’t know why you did it and you didn’t want him.”
Nate doesn’t drop his hands from my waist, and this proves overwhelming. I can’t think or utter a word in response.
“I’ve never wanted him.” I go on. “I’ve actually never liked any guy in that way. No one, until you. Stupidly, I assumed handling you as I did all those other guys was expected and normal and usual, but you’re not any of that.”
I hang my head, again. I feel for his hand at my waist, and hold mine over it to feel his skin. Nate tries to turn me to look at him, but I still can’t. This could go bad or good, and looking might make him see the dirty whore I am. The ruined person inside. But he’s too strong for me, so I close my eyes and twist.
Before I open my eyes I need to finish my thoughts, before I feel this is real and shut up about my feelings as I’ve always done.
“You’re the first boy I’ve liked, and I had no idea I liked you. Like isn’t even right because I’m just …”
I open my eyes and see the want in my thoughts mirrored in his gaze. I hold out my hands and they won’t quit trembling. How stupid! I clamp my hands on each other, but still feel it.
I don’t realise the shakes are gone until some time passes.
“I feel everything with you. I’m sorry it took years to get close, weeks to feel so intensely about you, and an instant to hurt you in the worst possible way.” I look up, my gaze direct, and say, “But I was running away from me, not you, and I hate that I had to fuck up to realise I like you.”
His eyelashes flutter, and his forehead creases.
“What did you say?”
“I like you, and more.”
“I needed to hear that before. Like, shit, we weren’t together, but we had something, ya know? To me, that something didn’t need to be said. I felt something with you.”
“Me … too.”
Nate shakes his head, chuckles once. “You didn’t feel the same way about me as I did for you, if you could do that.”
“That’s the thing.” I stare into his eyes, feeling how I’d rather just dream and be lost in them than whatever train wreck I cause every time I say something. “I knew we had more. I felt it, because I knew I was fucking it up. I didn’t want to hurt you, but I’m used to hurting me, and so I kept hurting me. I didn’t know what the hell to do with everything I felt for you, because I didn’t realise I was repressing.”
“That’s … God.” I think I hear him whisper as he draws his big hands down his face. “I came here to listen to why you did it and walk out.”
“Don’t go,” I tell him. I beg him. I’m reduced to pleading, and I know it won’t work because begging puts a person off more, but I’m desperate, wanting to just bear hug him so he can’t leave.
I draw the line before there, though.
“I have to,” he says.
And leaves.
• • •
Sitting at my desk, I have shamelessly spent the last quarter hour doodling hearts on sticky-note pads, my uni diary and other papers. I go back and erode the edges to give them a grunge look, and my latest one has a spear through it, and it leaks lead blood. My hair is pinned behind my ears, and after a while I feel tension between my eyebrows where I must have had them scrunched for too long. The air has been still and invisible, like a portal that keeps me in my own world and other comings and goings separate.
As soon as I hear a knock at my door, I unhook my hair from my ears to frame my face, but it’s just Mum.
I expected that.
She asks if I want to come on a shopping day with her and the twins, and I agree, telling her to just chill out and I’ll get their stuff ready and whatnot.
“Want a shopping trip? Mum wants to buy you some monster trucks. I told her you guys would love it?”
My unsure voice has Seth and Tristan pleading. I get Seth into a printed top with a little hoodie. Tristan couldn’t care less, so I put him in jeans and a plain, long-sleeved shirt.
When I come back from getting the boys ready, Mum’s softly snoring. I tell the twins to shush and get their favourite fruit bars and tubs of sliced fruit in juice for when the time comes and they’re starved to death. When I’ve packed a little paper bag I toss it in my handbag, and they sink to their knees on the rug, building structures with their blocks.
I sit on the tiles beside Mum on the couch. She looks peaceful resting, but must sense me there and her eyes snap open, jolting me back.
“Our day is going to be so good, Kalli.” She jerks up as if she’d never been down and rubs her hands together.
“Boys,” she calls, as they turn and drop everything in their hands. “We’re getting monster trucks and we’ll search every store until we get two perfect ones.”
Our afternoon transpires onward and upward. Mum, Seth and Tristan look like they’re having the time of their lives. We enter a small, boutique toyshop. Price tags are printed—I’m sure—for shock value. There’s a toy figure crafted so alike a full-scale sports car I have to squint at it in my hands just to make sure someone hasn’t shrunk the real deal. When Mum starts making vrooommm sounds and the boys follow suit, all three of them crawling on the floor with the cars still in the boxes, I’m not surprised when a man in a suit comes around from the back and tells us we probably can find what we’re looking for at Toys R Us.
It gets worse at Toys R Us (or better, depending on how you look at it). A whole store dedicated to every sort of toy for children of all different ages.
“Hey, kiddos,” I say. All three turn. “I’ll just grab an ice cream and wait in the food court.”
Mum nods and the boys go back to playing. I can’t get out of there fast enough.
I buy an ice cream from McDonald’s and savour the crunchy pieces. Still waiting, I buy some chips. As I’m a couple away from finishing, I see the twins. They come barrelling down the food court, getting everyone’s attention. They both have one over-sized shopping bag in each hand.
They jump all over the place and try to unpack their monster trucks right there, but I manage to break them a deal to hold on. A deal that involves ice cream.
When Mum sits beside me, I say, “You’re in a good mood today.”
She nudges me. Gives me a look. “Don’t you know it. We had so much fun. ‘Ey boys?”
They are licking so hard and fast neither notice.
“Oh well. I think that’s a yes?”
“I agree.”
We sit, watching the boys and waiting for this silence between us to end.
“Can I ask you a question?” I say after a while.
“Sure, Kalli. What’s up?”
“Was it hard? Stopping, I mean? Not just that, but was it hard missing out with Betsy, or spending your weekend at home instead?”
“Life’s too short to be sad. We had a great day today, didn’t we?”
“Yeah, but that’s not what I meant.”
Mum looks away, but I notice she bites her lips and pulls her hands under the table. She needs to hide them from me? Just like that, I go from feeling on top of the world to having that feeling turn dark and overwhelming in a flash.
“You’re so serious. I want to make my family happy. Didn’t you have fun today?”
“Equals parts embarrassment and fun, yeah,” I agree.
“When did we stop having fun like this?”
I eat the last of my chips, carrying out the moment as long as I can, unnoticed. “Oh, I don’t know.” It’s the most respectful answer. What I’ve always thought was age ten, and the times before and after you were with Chester. Chester was the only good man in your life.
“For me, I’ll always regret losing contact with the first boyfriend I moved in with. But it put a rift between you and I, so it was for the best, in the end.”
She can’t be serious. He was a monster; didn’t He ever fuck her like he fucked me?
Mum leans in, lowers her voice while the twins are poking at their ice cream and licking their fingers. “Chester and I were always too different. It was sweet, though. It’s just a shame. But the kids … well, with you guys, we’ve had a great day.”
I don’t answer, just pull out my phone because I can pull off being a typical rude teenager. That’s normal and easy. And I have to can this topic right here and now.
“You okay?”
I slowly put down my phone, pretend to look at something important for as long as possible before snatching up her gaze. “Sure, why?”
“Ah, nothing.”
19
It’s the first time Nate has initiated a text to me since my Donovan fuck up. We haven’t spoken since he came here that day. I’ve texted with little silly emotes but that didn’t say much, and he didn’t send anything back.
Now, as I stare at my phone with his message, I forget my toast is cooling and I’m hungry. Funny how in a moment my body can send signals to my head—groaning stomach that actually feels like something sharp is turning over inside me, images of food rolling around in my thoughts, and then change them to my gut clenching at the thought of both reading and ignoring the text. The anticipation is a box of sustenance, and inside it could actually be anything. Sitting here about to read it is almost too enticing, but eventually I open the text:
Nate: Meet me at the café?
Kalli: Now? Yup, leaving. What’s up?
Nate: You’ll see.
You’ll see. Two words that have sent my head in a spin. The house is moving for a moment or two until I blink rapidly and focus on my cooling toast.
I let out my hair, spray more perfume on for good measure, and touch up my light makeup. I change my T-shirt for a tight, low-cut tank. I don’t have pride to protect, so I might as well use what I’ve got.
When I arrive, I spot Nate with one of his arms curled around the back of the couch that he is pressed hard against. He has two vanilla chai lattes and I focus on my straight, yet content face. This doesn’t mean he’s happy with me. Don’t be overbearing.
I leave a respectable gap and wedge my handbag on my other side. I place my hands in my lap. Then, realising I look like a British royal or a VIP, I loosen my grip and fumble, something to do with my hands.
Nate pulls out the photo book I did for him. He flicks right to the last few pages, which doesn’t make sense because I haven’t added any photos that far down.
But he has.
The open page has me arched back on the piano, closely resembling Michelle Pfeiffer in The Fabulous Baker Boys in that amazing scene, except I’m in my lace underwear in the fields. The image has a misty tone to it, with the colours paired down, the background blurred and some effect to draw attention to me modelling.
I look …
“Tell me this story,” Nate says.
“Nate.”
I hang my head. The others were specia
l, funny, even mundane, but perfect because Nate took the shot or was in them, and they had a memorable story behind them for both of us. This one just reminds me of the beginning of The Mess and the past comes crashing back like an unexpected recoil slapped to my chest.
I fight the urge to splutter. Since it’s an imagined sensation, not a literal one, I focus on pushing it away to somewhere I can’t think of right now, and it works.
“That was Kalli crazy for your attention. That was her becoming infatuated with you, although she didn’t know it was happening.”
Nate rubs his thumb in a circle over the picture. “More.”
“Um.” I look up to his eyes, but he’s still locked on the photo.
“That Kalli wasn’t sure what to feel because she hadn’t been in a situation like that before—caring about someone. She wanted all your attention—craved it.”
“Was it too much to ask to give me all of your attention?”
I close my eyes and remain still. I start seeing the path. The inevitable road where this will lead no matter what I do. I could fight my case and have him teetering on the edge of will-I, won’t-I, or I could suck up to him, be too overbearing, and have him back off completely.
A tear betrays me, slips from my closed eyes and it’s hot down the side of my nose. I don’t want to wipe it because that will draw attention to the fact I’m crying when I really have no right to.
“Come here,” Nate says, holding out his arms.
He was astute to notice, anyway.
I blink at his fingers, wanting to escape in his touch, but repelled at the same time by the sympathy. I absolutely don’t want to start that. Being a charity case would hurt more.
“Kall Bell.” Nate snatches up my lingering fingers, debating his hands. “Here,” he says as he holds me against his chest.
So many questions run through my mind. There’s everything to ask, and yet I just be. I hold onto this moment and erase the rest. This is a hug, and it’s not linked to anything good or bad. Nate has his arms tensed around my body, trapping my arms still, where they lie near his waist. I hesitate then slip my arms around his middle.
Being Kalli Page 12
